


of the covenant

by shakespork



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Brothers, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Humor, BAMF Haruno Sakura, BAMF Uzumaki Naruto, Canon Rewrite, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Childhood Trauma, Dai-nana-han | Team 7 (Naruto) Feels, Family Dynamics, Gen, Naruto Grows Up With The Uchiha AU, References to PTSD, Uchiha Massacre
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-28
Updated: 2019-01-02
Packaged: 2019-09-29 05:26:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 20,924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17197382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shakespork/pseuds/shakespork
Summary: "The first time she hears him referred to as “Naruto Uchiha”, she decides that she’s made her point clear enough."After the Nine-Tail's attack, the Uchiha clan take in Naruto and raise him as one of their own.





	1. Before

**Author's Note:**

> It's almost New Year's so I'm clearing out my files and this AU was there.... enjoy I guess.  
> It's a WIP but I'll upload more chapters when they come

The night after the demon fox is sealed, and the village finally falls into the quiet hush of mourning, Mikoto makes her way through the rubble to what she knows will be a tragedy.

 

The Namikaze house is a pile of broken wood and scattered brick, strewn up over the street and into the garden behind it. Shattered plates, furniture, the remnants of fabrics that may once have been clothes and curtains litter the ruin. Mikoto thinks she sees Kushina’s bridal gift—a delicately-carved katana—rent to pieces by the fight, and she wants to cry.

Their house isn’t the only one flattened—the whole street is gone. There are piles of stones and half-collapsed walls as far as she can see. Some of the houses aren’t even recognisable as houses any more, and their outlines blur into each other until everything looks like a sea of grief.

 

She stands there for a while—could be hours, could be minutes—just struggling to control her breathing. It burns in her chest. She wants to scream, to shout, to just close her eyes and pretend otherwise.

 

She was one of the first to learn of Kushina’s death, just hours before. She didn’t see the body. The ninja that told her was a nondescript ANBU, high enough in the chain to have heard the whispers. Though not exactly protocol, he must’ve known how close she and Kushina were—enough to warrant a sympathetic hint.

 

The wind feels cold on her face, and Mikoto realises she is crying. Her tears drip onto the ground, mixing with dust.

 

Somewhere, distantly, a child is crying. Not hers, not— Not Kushina’s, but...

 

The sound sparks something in her, fierce like a fire. It burns worse than the pain, and her feet itch to run.

 

Staring at the house, this once-portent of happiness and hope, Mikoto makes up her mind. She turns towards the Hokage tower, where Hiruzen is even now holding the infant Naruto close to his chest, and she body-flickers away towards it.

 

Her best friend may have died tonight, but Mikoto’s loyalty to her has not.

 

 

 

 

 

Fugaku takes one look at Mikoto’s expression and snaps his mouth shut. She’s clutching Naruto to her chest like she would fight Fugaku for him, daring Fugaku to order her down, and Fugaku realises that he cannot.

 

There was plenty to respect about Minato. Minato was powerful and kind, even to the Uchiha. He may not have stood for them but he didn’t stand against them, and Fugaku was always quietly grateful for that.

Fugaku may not have loved Minato, but Mikoto had loved Minato’s wife, and Fugaku loves Mikoto.

 

Whatever the clan says, Fugaku is still the head. They will listen. He will make them.

 

He pulls his wife into his arms, inhaling the smell of ash and metal from her hair. It makes something in his chest ache, knowing that his wife was out there, in that terrible aftermath.

 

Between them, Naruto snuffles, and falls deeper into sleep.

 

 

 

 

 

Sarutobi sighs, his eyes drooping.

 

“Lord Uchiha, please—” he says.

 

“Don’t ‘Lord Uchiha’ me, you’re my kid’s godfather,” Fugaku snaps, nails digging into his seat. His uniform is crusted with dust and god-knows what else.

 

Sarutobi looks worse. His eyes are tired, and Fugaku knows why.

 

“Please,” he says, gentling his tone. “You have enough to worry about now. Let me take care of this one thing.”

 

Sarutobi pressed his lips together, hunching his shoulders. “I promised Kushina I would take care of him.”

 

“And you will,” says Fugaku. “But you are busy, and you won’t have time to raise a child.”

 

Sarutobi straightens. “The shinobi orphanage—”

 

“You would place Minato’s son in an _orphanage_?” Fugaku says.

 

Sarutobi tries to hold his gaze, but he wavers. His wife is still in the hospital, comatose. ICU. The orphanage will be flooded with new arrivals after the attack. Somewhere in there, amidst the rubble, Minato’s son would be lost.

Sarutobi knows both Kushina and Minato were orphans, both always wanted to give their son a family, and Sarutobi doesn’t want to be the one to betray that wish.

 

“He’ll be in danger,” Sarutobi whispers.

 

“Then let us protect him,” Fugaku replies gently. He can see Sarutobi’s resistance crumble, so he pushes: “We are the strongest clan in the village. Naruto will be safe nowhere if not with us.”

 

Sarutobi takes in a shuddering breath, and his hand spasms once around the armrest of his chair.

 

“All right,” he says.

 

 

 

 

 

Itachi is a smart kid, but he’s still only seven. Mikoto wakes him up that night, after she’s put Sasuke to sleep and settled Naruto into his own cot. The two babies share a room, and their sleeping breaths ring moth-like against the soft wood walls of the nursery. She takes Itachi’s hand and leads him over to Naruto.

 

“Do you remember my friend, Kushina?” Mikoto whispers.

 

Itachi nods.

 

“This is her son,” she says.

 

Itachi looks at the baby, and then understands. “Is Mrs Namikaze…?”

 

Mikoto nods. She doesn’t want to cry in front of her son, but the grief is still fresh. She struggles. She’s aware that she hasn’t processed it yet, that she hadn’t had enough time to, not really. She has to force herself to be better, to be strong for her family. Still, something must show in her eyes.

 

Itachi puts a little hand on her shoulder and says, “It’s OK, Mother.”

 

The laugh that tumbles out of her is abrupt, and she tries to quieten it. She pulls him in and wraps her arms around him tightly, like she is trying to anchor herself to him. Itachi has always been a serious boy, and sometimes he acts much older than he should. It makes her sad, and proud.

 

“We have to help him, Itachi,” she whispers. “We have to keep him safe.”

 

He doesn’t understand it yet, but he feels it deep in his chest. He hugs her back, and says quietly, “Ok.”

 

 

 

 

 

In the council halls, Sarutobi fights his case out with the elders, who insist that Naruto be put in the orphanage under an assumed name.

 

“Namikaze made a lot of enemies during the war,” Koharu argues, banging her walking stick on the floor. “It makes no sense to give the boy such a provocative name.” The air is crisp with cold tension. “That’s not even mentioning that he is a jinchuuriki,” She ads, huffing. “All of Konoha’s rivals will be looking to put the child down, or use him.”

 

Sarutobi snaps, “ _Exactly_ —so why not let the Uchiha protect him?” He turns on Koharu. “And to deny him his name? Minato died making Naruto a hero.” _Our precious people died making Naruto a hero._

 

Koharu quietens at that, staring at their feet. Biwako had passed away in her coma a few hours before, the blow to her head too damaging to fix. They all knew her, and loved her.

 

“Don’t let your emotions blind you,” Koharu warns.

 

Sarutobi harrumps into his chest and sits down, massaging the bridge of his nose.

 

Surprisingly, it’s Homura that breaks the silence. He licks his lips and clears his throat, before rasping: “I think…” His voice falters for a moment before he collects himself. “I think this child’s life has been too much defined by cold logic.” He looks up at them both, and says, “Kushina Uzumaki died to restrain the fox, the Fourth Hokage died to give us a weapon. Both of them, when forced to choose between their child and the village, chose the village.”

 

Koharu and Sarutobi still.

 

Homura continues: “And now, should we logically put this child in an orphanage? Should we lie to him about his heritage and deny him his name?”

 

Koharu’s breath wavers and she whispers, “Homura…”

 

He waves her off. “No, I am not criticising you, Utatane. You’re right: giving him to the Uchiha is a risk—” He swallows and frowns, looking around and catching all of their eyes. “—But maybe it’s a risk worth taking?”

 

Koharu deflates like a popped balloon. Her eyes look tired. The lines of her face are deeper than they were this morning. How did Sarutobi not notice before?

 

 

Naruto stays with the Uchiha.

 

 

Danzo remains silent during the whole debate.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It takes a month before the whole village knows. People pass by the Uchiha clan district and eye them suspiciously. Most of them don’t know what to think.

Mikoto uses this to her advantage.

 

She knows better than most the dire straits that her clan is in.

 

Absent during the Kyuubi attack, unaccounted for in the hours preceding it. It looks suspicious. It _is_ suspicious. She knows where they were, in that decrepit secret temple in the middle of the woods, but nobody else can know. The truth is more incriminating that the lie.

 

Naruto, despite being all of thirty-odd days old, helps. She makes sure he’s seen, and that the people know he’s Namikaze’s son.

 

She also makes sure that they don’t know that he’s the Kyuubi host. First, to protect her clan. Then, when she sees Naruto’s joyful smile for the first time, to protect him too.

She lets her aunties and cousins spread rumours that the Kyuubi died with Kushina. The village believes it instantly. The dread monster is dead at last. They want to believe it.

 

Instead, she dresses Naruto in Uchiha colours—red, black, blue—and takes him with Itachi and Sasuke to the market. She embroiders the Uchiha fan in careful stitches just below the Uzumaki swirl. She lets his hair grow long and ties it into a low knot at the nape.

Running around the district, he would look like any other Uchiha child if not for his bright colouring.

 

The first time she hears him referred to as “Naruto Uchiha”, she decides that she’s made her point clear enough.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Itachi thought it would be harder to love Naruto because he wasn’t blood. He was wrong.

Naruto’s first word, much like Sasuke’s, is a mangled attempt at Itachi’s name. He’s six months old. He says it stubbornly, and then frowns when the consonants refuse to obey him.

 

“What?” says Itachi, stunned.

 

Naruto frowns, and it would be thunderous if it wasn’t so painfully adorable. “I..chi,” he forces out.

 

“What?”

 

“I—chi!”

 

“Are you sneezing?”

 

Mother comes from around the corner and looks at them. She’s holding Sasuke to her chest. “Are you teasing him again?”

 

“No.” Itachi does his best to look innocent.

 

Naruto cries out, “I—chi!”

 

The noise startles Sasuke awake. He turns in Mother’s arms, indignant, and faces Naruto.

 

Naruto stares back.

 

“Achi!” says Sasuke.

 

“I—chi!” replies Naruto.

 

“Are they arguing?” says Mikoto. She jostles Sasuke, but he won’t look at her. He’s locked in some intense staredown with Naruto, both of them competing to pronounce Itachi’s name correctly. Mikoto wonders if she should be jealous, since it’s not her name they’re fighting over, but the situation is too cute for that. She should’ve brought over her camera.

 

She opens her mouth to call one of the servants, but Itachi catches her eye and winks conspiratorially. He’s got a small polaroid in his hands, and he bites his tongue while he snaps a picture. It comes out the other side, and the babies still haven’t noticed.

 

“I—chi!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The first time Fugaku thinks of all three boys as his, he freezes. He’s sitting with Mikoto on their porch, drinking tea. The sun is setting. In the yard in front of them, Naruto and Sasuke run around squealing, slapping each other in a toddler game of tag. Off to the side, Itachi sits under the shadow of the wall and whittles away at a small branch. Occasionally, the two toddlers scamper over to him with some request, and he whispers an answer in their ears before they’re off again.

 

None of them see Fugaku freeze, but Mikoto does.

 

“What’s wrong?” she says into her teacup. She hasn’t even turned to look at him, knowing him well enough.

 

He shakes his head. The tea is bitter, just like he likes it.

 

Now Mikoto looks over, with an unimpressed expression.

 

He looks at her for a moment or two, following the lines of her face. There are minute wrinkles gathering around her eyes, and the scars on her face are more visible in this light. Around the fragile china of the teacup, her fingers are calloused and strong.

 

He leans over and presses a soft kiss to her cheek.

 

Their boys stop to watch. Unsurprisingly, Naruto and Sasuke both wrinkle their noses and stick out their tongues at their parents’ grossness.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Naruto is never seen without a shirt on, though, not even when he’s swimming. While other little kids run bare, soaking in the sun, he wears it stubbornly, with pride, and nobody dares question it. Sasuke does it too—the two of them running by the river at full pelt, little terrors, with shirts in every colour. Soon, Itachi does it too, and shrugs loftily when people ask him about it.

 

Clan members titter at Mikoto’s supposed insistence on modesty, and then over Itachi’s apparent shyness, and then finally over Sasuke’s and Naruto’s antics. Mikoto only smiles when she overhears it, and people take it as confirmation for their own private theories.

 

A few months later, there’s more Uchiha kids wearing shirts to the river. Mikoto wonders if she should feel guilty, if those little kids will grow up feeling somehow ashamed of their bodies, but it’s worth it to keep Naruto’s seal a secret. Plus, it’s the Uchiha clan—no cloth barrier on earth could dampen their confidence. Mikoto only has to look at the clan elders to know.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Naruto knows he is adopted. Sasuke knows. Their cousins know, even those small enough to be confused about it. They don’t talk about it often—they’re a reserved family—but the fact of it lives alongside them comfortably.

When Mikoto pulls out her old photo albums, she gathers her sons close and points out the people captured there.

 

“Here’s my old teacher,” she says, pointing at the scowling face of Masuo Nara. Her finger drifts to another photograph. “Here’s me with your father when we just met.” The three boys express their squeamishness in the Uchiha way, by looking at her sideways. Mikoto snorts.

 

She turns the page, and there’s Kushina, smiling up at them. Even after half a decade, the sight make Mikoto’s heart ache.

 

“There’s your mom, Naruto,” she says, and looks up at him. He’s looking at Kushina, a gentle smile on his face. He knows her.

 

“She named you after a fishcake,” Sasuke says, grinning devilishly at Naruto.

 

“Hey!” Naruto says.

 

“I’m named after a rodent,” Itachi says, and sounds so tired.

 

“A weasel isn’t a rodent,” says Mikoto. Itachi stares at the wall. “It’s a muskrat.”

 

“A rat!” Naruto crows.

 

“A muskrat is still a rodent,” says Sasuke.

 

Mikoto shuts the album. Enough photos for today.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When Naruto turns six, three months after Sasuke, Fugaku signs them up for the Academy. The boys are old enough to be eager, waving dulled kunai around and pestering Itachi to teach them jutsu tricks. They’ve strong-armed him into teaching them both the Kawarimi and Bunshin, though neither have actually managed to cast them successfully. Yet.

 

The Academy principal looks over the boys’ documents and expresses surprise. “They’re a bit young, aren’t they?” she says, and then hums. “But… considering they’re Itachi’s brothers…”

 

Fugaku nods, his customary frown in place.

 

“Alright,” says the principal, stamping both forms with red ink and handing them back to Fugaku. She leans over her desk and smiles at Naruto and Sasuke. “I guess I’ll see you both in September.”

 

The boys beam back and tug at Fugaku’s hands in excitement as he leads them out of the building.

 

“Are we finally going to be ninja?” says Naruto.

 

“Can we ask Itachi to teach us more jutsu?” Sasuke follows up.

 

Mikoto had cut their hair the day before, so it sticks up comically in all directions, on Naruto especially. Fugaku does his best not to reach over and smooth it down on the both of them.

 

“Don’t pester your brother,” he says instead.

 

The boys pout and turn away, going back to their little brooding behaviours: Sasuke hunches his shoulders and Naruto stomps a little louder than usual.

 

Fugaku sighs. It’ll be unbecoming of their family if someone saw them moody like this.

 

“How about,” he says, and then thinks a little. “I will teach you both the Great Fireball.”

 

It takes a moment for the words to sink in. When they do, Naruto whirls around in shock and Sasuke squeaks.

 

“Really?” they both cry out in unison.

 

Fugaku cringes at the volume. A flock of birds is startled from their nest in a nearby tree.

 

“Yes,” he says.

 

The boys squeal and then burst into a stream of excited chatter between themselves, completely ignoring Fugaku. He catches words like ‘awesome’ and ‘ninja’ a few times before checking out, relieved to have avoided a prolonged sulk. He remembers the last time it happened, how displeased Mikoto was with him, and shudders.

 

Then, he wonders at the levels of her displeasure if he returns their sons home singed, and starts rethinking teaching them the jutsu. As if sensing it, the two boys stop, turn to him, and simultaneously raise an eyebrow.

 

The three of them stare at each other. It’s a little uncanny at how much these two resemble Itachi at that moment.

 

Fugaku succumbs and reaffirms, “I will teach you the… the Great Fireball.”

 

Naruto and Sasuke beam, turn back to each other, and continue their discussion, tugging Fugaku along.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the depths of Root HQ, Danzo plots.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s the first time Iruka is acting as a class leader, and he doesn’t know how to feel about his newly-minted students. Someone in Administration, he thinks, has set him up for a prank. That’s the only thing that explains the six clan heirs, the chakra-manipulation prodigies, and the two Uchiha boys.

 

Several months later, when he’s actually gotten to know them all, Iruka would realise his mistake.

See, he focused too much on the heirs, on the Ino-Shika-Cho trio, expecting that they would need special tutorship. The responsibility of educating them would weigh too heavy on his mind.

He should have been paying attention to the Uchiha.

 

They’re perfect students—perfect.

They handwriting is crisp and clear, their homework always turned in on time. They come in dressed in matching uniforms, with their hair brushed back and pinned with silver clips. They pick up knowledge as fast as it comes, executing every jutsu and kata and flick of a kunai with apt precision.

Iruka would be so wrong to assume this meant they were easy students.

 

Naruto and Sasuke are hellions.

Little, quiet, polite hellions but hellions nonetheless. They’re notorious pranksters, and Iruka fails to catch on fast enough because they’re just so damn good at acting innocent. They sprinkle erased dust over the blinds, sending instructors into coughing fits; they stuff books with glitter that explodes outwards; they slip pins under teachers’ desks.

Then they sit back, smile demurely when someone asks them who did it, and plot their next joke.

 

The worse part is that they’re just six. Iruka shudders imaging who they’ll become in the next couple of years.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Itachi begins spending a lot of time away from them.

They don’t like it. When he comes back from a mission, tired and dirty and with a distant look in his eyes, they try to distract them. They don’t like how he looks, like his happiness is being leached away from him. They don’t know how to fix it.

 

“Train with us!” Sasuke insists, tugging on Itachi’s sleeve. There’s a coppery splatter on it that he doesn’t need to question. They’re kids, but they’re shinobi kids.

 

“You promised to help us with shuriken,” Naruto adds.

 

“I’m sorry,” says Itachi. He shrugs them off, pokes them both in the forehead, and walks past them like they’re not there.

 

Naruto looks about one minute away from a tantrum. His hair is coming undone from it’s ponytail. Sasuke puts one hand on his shoulder and presses down.

 

“He’s okay,” he says.

 

“He’s not,” Naruto snaps back. His fists shake at his side.

 

Sasuke wishes he could do the same. Naruto was always more open with his emotions. “He’s okay,” he says again. It’s a mantra to him now.

 

This time, Naruto doesn’t counter.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“You understand, don’t you?”

 

The silence is heavy. The air itself feels like it’s holding its breath, waiting. Waiting.

 

Itachi’s face is blank. “Of course, councilman.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There’s something weird happening with the clan. Sasuke doesn’t really notice it until Naruto points it out.

 

“They’re acting strange,” he whispers as he tugs Sasuke aside. They’re outside their house, watching a group of older clansmen talking at the end of the street.

 

“Huh?”

 

Naruto’s eyes narrow, picking out the shifting movements of the adults. “It feels like…” And then he stops.

 

Sasuke waits, and waits. Naruto doesn’t say anything. Sasuke steps in front of him, and then shakes Naruto a little.

 

“It feels like what?” he says.

 

“Malice.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They pack their school bags early. Mikoto is quiet. Fugaku is quiet.

 

Naruto looks between them, trying to read the situation.

 

Sasuke holds onto Naruto’s sleeve as they walk to the Academy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The whole day feels like the sun is about to burst and die out.

 

They feel it burning through the glass, filling them with anticipatory energy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

And then…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Don’t look, Sasuke!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Itachi’s Mangekyou spins, and spins, and spins.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Red chakra swirls around Naruto like a storm.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The ANBU arrive after sunset.

The delay will not be questioned by them yet.

 

Naruto’s fingernails are crusted with dried blood. It’s so black that it looks like he’s been digging graves.

 

Sasuke’s eyes look past him.


	2. After

Sarutobi oversees the mess personally. He’s there thirty minutes after the ANBU arrive, barking orders for containment and control.

 

There’s around twenty people here already, crawling over the Uchiha compound, chakra sensors and trackers and sealing masters milling in with each other until it’s a black mass of nervous energy. In the centre, right by the hastily-erected medic tent, sit the two surviving boys.

Sarutobi pushes through the crowd until he sees them, and his heart breaks. Naruto is wrapped tight around Sasuke, not looking at him but not looking anywhere else either. Sasuke’s eyes are stuck in red, a single tomoe spinning lazily while he stares at nothing.

 

Then, Sarutobi senses the Kyuubi’s chakra. Faint, but there.

 

Sarutobi pulls aside a captain and says, “Take Naruto to Containment.”

 

He’s not foolish enough to think nobody else has noticed. They were all there seven years ago. They know what it feels like. The fact that none of them have reacted too badly is a blessing enough. They all know who Naruto is, know in some way what he is, but it’s been so long since a reminder surfaced, and Uchiha Mikoto was a professional at cover-ups.

 

The captain nods. “Right away, sir.”

 

Immediately, three more ANBU appear by his side to help him. They try to do it gently, tapping Naruto on the shoulder and explaining to him that he needs to come with them. He doesn’t look like he understands, or that’s he hearing anything at all.

 

The ANBU pull him away from Sasuke, and Sasuke comes alive. His head snaps up as soon as Naruto moves, and he opens his mouth and just screams.

 

Naruto is screaming too, the red chakra exploding from out of him, spinning. It’s sharp, too—from where he’s standing, Sarutobi sees it slice the ANBU’s uniform open.

 

Sasuke is holding tight to Naruto. More ANBU appear, grasping at Sasuke and pulling the two boys apart. Sasuke’s eyes bleed red, the tomoe spinning and spinning. His voice is hoarse.

 

They’re too raw for words, too shell-shocked by the nightmare they’re living to form coherent sentences. Not even names; they just scream and scream and scream until someone knocks Sasuke unconscious and Naruto screams louder.

 

“The sedatives aren’t working, Lord Hokage!”

 

The ANBU’s arms are bleeding from a dozen different cuts. The Kyuubi’s chakra is corrosive, lashing out. Naruto’s screams sound animalistic now, coming out as a torn howl. His red slitted eyes turn to Sarutobi, and Sarutobi can’t see a boy any more. It’s a demon.

 

He raises a hand and delivers one smooth jab to the base Naruto’s skull, just like Tsunade taught him. A small burst of chakra to the brainstem and Naruto slumps in the ANBU’s arms like a ragdoll, the red chakra dissipating abruptly.

 

In the sudden silence, the night feels too still.

 

Sarutobi releases a breath. He nods to the ANBU, who slings Naruto over his shoulder and body flickers away, followed by two more agents. Sarutobi turns to Sasuke, lying still as the medics keep checking him over.

 

“Take him…” Sarutobi starts, and he feels very tired. “Take him to the hospital.”

 

 

 

 

 

Sasuke wakes up in a white bed facing the window. The sky outside is blue. A cloud hangs it in, moving so slowly it might as well be still. For a moment, he wonders why he’s here. The floor smells like disinfectant.

 

Then, his heart kicks into a wild hammer. He jerks up, pulling on his IV line, and screams.

 

There is a series of startled beeps, and an alarms kicks into a wail. A nurse bursts in in a flurry of white. She’s saying something to him, over and over, but he can’t hear.

 

“Naruto!”

 

She opens her mouth and a garble of sound comes out.

 

“ _Naruto!_ ” he screams.

 

 

 

 

 

From behind the one-way mirror, Sarutobi watches five sealing masters examine Naruto. The boy lies unconscious on a grey metal slab, his wrists and ankles restrained with leather bands. There is a rubber bit in his mouth. He looks small, dwarfed by the cold adults and the darkened room and the inevitable knowledge of loss that his unconsciousness is keeping at bay.

Sarutobi wonders—did Naruto realise what was happening? Did he understand what Itachi did? When he held Sasuke so tight that it bruised Sasuke’s skin black, was it to keep Sasuke from breaking, or himself?

 

One of the sealing masters turns towards the mirror and nods.

 

Sarutobi takes a moment to push his thoughts away, and then turns to leave.

 

Behind him, the ninja unbuckle Naruto, taking him into another room. The seal is tight, but needs some time to stabilise.

 

 

 

 

 

Three days pass.

 

Sasuke has never seen the sky this blue, and grey, and red, and black. He doesn’t look away.

 

Nobody comes to see him. He doesn’t know anyone outside the clan. The Uchiha have always been reserved.

 

During the small hours of the night, when he can’t sleep, he wonders if this is a dream. If he is the only survivor. If he imagined Naruto there, that night, after Itachi. It feels very far away, sometimes, and sometimes if he breathes too deeply he can still smell the blood. He presses into the bruises on his arms and the dull pain reassures him.

 

He doesn’t ask any more questions. He doesn’t speak to the nurses, the doctors, the medic nin. He barely looks at them. He doesn’t think he wants any answers, not yet. When the ANBU come to question him, he stares at the sky, and stares and stares. Blue burns into his eyes.

 

 

 

 

 

One day, Sasuke opens his eyes, turns his head to the left, and Naruto is on the bed beside him. He’s unconscious. There are bruises under his eyes, but Sasuke imagines his look the same.

 

He doesn’t realise he’s crying until it’s all he can do. His breathing hitches and breaks into heaving sobs, tears running and sinking into the pillow under his head.

 

“ _Naruto,_ ” he says, and sits up, easing himself onto his feet. It’s the first time he’s moved properly in a week. His knees buckle, and he grabs onto the bed rails to stay standing.

 

The two feet of floor between his bed and Naruto’s feel like miles. He stumbles over, every limb aching, and crawls onto Naruto’s bed.

 

“Naruto,” he sobs. He shakes Naruto’s shoulders. The bed rattles. Sasuke stops. He didn’t realise how hard he’d done it.

 

“Naruto.” It feels like the only word he’s ever known.

 

Naruto stirs with a groan, his eyes blinking open and then squinting against the pale light of the morning.

 

“ _Sasuke…?_ ” he whispers. His voice is hoarse.

 

Sasuke lets out a sound of pain and then crushes Naruto to himself, sobbing into his hair. His arms are skinny and even paler for the hospital gown he’s wearing. Naruto’s hair smells like dust and disinfectant. Not like himself, not like home, and Sasuke is grateful.

 

Naruto hugs him back hard, nails digging into Sasuke’s back. He’s shivering.

 

They’re fragile right now, the both of them, desperate to get back to some semblance of normal all the while knowing that they never will. The realisation hovers above them, somewhere near the ceiling, and Sasuke keeps crying into Naruto’s hair. A damp patch grows on Sasuke’s chest and he knows Naruto feels it too.

 

 

 

 

 

“We’re going to put you in an apartment together,” says Sarutobi. “Unless you prefer to be separate?”

 

Sasuke’s grip nearly breaks Naruto’s hand. Sarutobi takes that as a no.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Uchiha brothers are strange, Sakura thinks.

 

From a distance, they look nothing alike—dark and light, black and blue, pale and tan—but if you look closer, you start seeing the similarities. They sit in the back of the classroom, eyes fixed in unison on the board. Their clothes are pressed and tidy, and they do almost everything together. Not even the teachers can separate them.

 

She and Ino argue constantly about which one is the most crush-worthy. That’s important to them now—crushes. To Sakura, it’s obviously Naruto. He isn’t as distant as Sasuke, but there’s something edgy about him too. His hair looks soft and pale, bleached by the sun. He must spend a lot of time outside. When he smiles, his teeth are sharp. She thinks it’s kind of cool.

 

Ino likes Sasuke, though. She likes the way Sasuke’s pale skin and black hair makes him look delicate, but also dangerous. She saw this picture once, on the cover of a fantasy novel, of a really attractive vampire, and she’s thought Sasuke looked like that ever since. Plus, she thinks Sasuke’s family dress looks better on him.

 

“Why?” says Sakura, wrinkling her nose.

 

“Because,” says Ino, and she’s using that tone Sakura hates, like she’s smarter than her. “It suits his colour pallette.” Sakura doesn’t think Ino knows what that word really means. She just likes saying it. Pallette, with a little flick of the tongue against the roof of her mouth.

 

Sakura scowls. “That’s your opinion.”

 

“You should read more romance books,” says Ino.

 

They’re nine. Nobody is going to sell them romance books.

 

“I take them from mom’s library,” Ino continues, and flicks her hair over her shoulder. “They’re really informative.”

 

Ino likes big words, because her dad uses them a lot. Sakura likes to use them too now, because Ino is her friend. Or, rival. They haven’t decided yet. Rivals are also a thing in romance books, and Sakura is a big fan of reading. Still, she thinks she likes adventure books more.

 

“Whatever,” Sakura mutters, turning away. She’s had enough boy talk for the afternoon. “Come on, I want to pick some flowers for Miss Ichinaka’s class.”

 

 

 

 

 

Genma’s out on night patrol when he sees them sitting on the roof. It’s a building near the gate, old and tall, and you can see the forest from there. That’s what they’re watching. They’re sitting apart, about a foot between them, and they’re completely still.

 

Genma stops and looks, frowning. What are they doing here?

 

Then, Naruto turns to Sasuke and says something. Sasuke doesn’t say anything. Naruto turns back and stares again at the forest. After a minute, Sasuke murmurs a reply.

 

It’s weird, Genma thinks, seeing Naruto like this.

 

He was there, the night of the massacre. He saw Naruto only briefly, leaving just before they were taken away by medics and Containment. Mostly, he dealt with the bodies. Old, young, sick. He saw Mikoto and Fugaku in their home, sprawled over each other. There were two sets of small, bloodied footprints leading to and away from them. Mikoto’s face had a little handprint on it, like someone had touched her cheek.

 

Now, Naruto’s gaze is distant. The moonlight casts deep shadows under his eyes, his chin disappearing into the high-necked blue top. It hurts, somehow, to see Minato’s features cast into that cool Uchiha blankness.

 

Genma leaves them to their thoughts, passing silently behind them and continuing onto the rest of his patrol. When his commanding officer asks if he saw anything strange, Genma declines. He figures the two of them need their privacy right now.

 

 

 

 

 

Sometimes, Naruto comes back to their apartment and feels adrift. His senses are dimmed like an old lightbulb, flickering. He spends hours walking from one room to the next, just touching things, trying to convince himself that they’re really there.

 

Sasuke doesn’t do exactly that, but he does spend hours staring out of windows. He barely blinks. Then, he sleeps for days.

 

Sometimes they forget to have dinner, and breakfast, and lunch.

 

Sometimes they eat ravenously. They spend hundreds of ryou on salted chips and chocolate and greasy fries, and then eat until they feel like throwing up.

 

Sometimes, Naruto clutches kunai a little too hard, until the metal digs into his palms and slices them open. It stings, but it’s real, it’s there. The blood is red, like he remembers. It’s not intentional. It’s an accident.

 

Sasuke bandages Naruto’s palms gently, and Naruto can see similar scars across Sasuke’s hands. They’re different, more pin-pricks than long lines—puckered white.

 

“You’re okay,” Naruto whispers.

 

“I’m okay,” Sasuke whispers back.

 

He keeps holding Naruto’s hand, just staring at it. They sit like that for a long time.

 

 

 

 

 

The forest is always there, and that never changes. They sit on the roof and watch it, following the way the wind makes the canopy roll like waves on the sea.

 

“What do we do?” says Naruto, turning to Sasuke.

 

Sasuke thinks, watching the forest. The air smells like summer, and the weather is getting warmer. Soon, they’ll be able to practice more, stay outside longer before the night chill sets in.

 

“We kill him,” he says.

 

 

 

 

 

The accelerate to the top of their class. Of course they do—they’ve been spending every free moment practicing together, alone, improving.

 

Itachi’s final words burn in their minds, even if they never mention them to each other.

 

They haven’t said his name out loud in almost two years. He’s only a pronoun to them— _“he”, “him”, “his”_. It’s easier that way. They can pretend that he died that night too, and the stranger they’ve been chasing in their heads is just that—a stranger.

 

 

 

 

 

Iruka keeps an eye on the two of them, just like the Hokage asked. It breaks his heart a little, every time he sees them.

 

He remembers them as they were before, and can’t find the same kids now. The little spark of something in their eyes is gone.

 

The Uchiha Incident, as it’s being called, was hushed up as much as possible. The shinobi population knows very little, and the general public even less. Iruka’s sure all of the clan leaders know something, and all of the Department Heads. Maybe even the Principal. A teacher like him, though? He’s done his best to piece it together from whispers.

 

Itachi was the one who did it. His face is plastered all over the bingo books now, marked _‘Extremely Dangerous’. ‘Do Not Engage’. ‘Flee on Sight’_. He wonders if the boys had seen it.

 

Every single Uchiha in the village was executed, except for them. They were lucky. Iruka doesn’t remember if they got held up—maybe they took the long way home—but they’re the only school kids that survived. Iruka found this coincidence difficult to accept. How unlucky could the Uchiha be, for all of them to be at the compound that night? No late-night workers, no night-time errands, nobody on an out-of-village mission.

 

Iruka’s not brave enough to ask those kind of questions, though.

 

He just looks up, at the two kids writing away on their tests, and feels grateful that at least two lives were spared.

Two lives would have to be enough.

 

 

 

 

 

The first time Naruto laughs—really laughs, with no hint of self-deprecation or irony—is fourteen months after. Sasuke counts.

 

It explodes out of him like it’s been building for a while. It’s so loud and sudden than Sasuke falls out of the kitchen chair and onto the floor. Naruto stops. Sasuke kind of hates himself for it.

 

The first time Sasuke laughs is fifteen minutes after that. Naruto looks so upset all of a sudden that Sasuke can’t help himself. It feels painful. His throat hurts, his chest hurts, but his heart doesn’t. It feels good.

 

Naruto picks him up and mutters, “It wasn’t that funny...”

 

Sasuke’s laughing so hard that he’s got tears streaming down his face. Why can’t he stop? Is this hysteria?

 

“N-Naruto,” he wheezes, clutching his sides. “I c-can’t sto-op.”

 

“Wh-what?” Naruto says, and giggles. Snorts. His shoulders begin to shake.

 

“D-Don’t you dare—” Sasuke chokes out, but it’s too late.

 

Naruto screeches, his whole chest shaking from the force of his guffaws. Sasuke’s pretty sure even the neighbours can hear him.

 

“Y-You b-as-stard,” Sasuke says, trying to stop. His sides hurt. He’s still laughing.

 

 

 

 

 

“Hey, Sasuke?” Naruto mutters, nudging his brother. They’re walking home, hands in pockets, and the sun is setting.

 

“Hmm?”

 

Naruto glances over his shoulder. “Did you hear something?”

 

Sasuke stops and frowns. “No…?”

 

“Okay.”

 

They keep walking. Then—a rustle. They whirl around. A bush, about five metres away from them, rustles again.

 

“What,” says Sasuke. “Is that?”

 

The bush giggles. It really, actually giggles. No, wait—there are three girls behind it, hiding. Now that Sasuke is looking he can see them clearly.

 

“What is happening,” says Naruto, and it’s not a question. It’s an expression of fear.

 

The three girls, apparently clocking that they’ve been caught, jump out from behind the bush and onto the path.

 

“Sasuke, Naruto!” the first one squeals.

 

“You found us!” the second one adds.

 

The two boys take a step back, preparing to run. The girls ignore that. The third girl turns to the second girl and gushes, “I told you they were cool, didn’t I?”

 

Naruto leans in minutely, and whispers, “Sasuke..?”

 

“Yeah..?” Sasuke whispers back just as quietly.

 

“I know what this is,” Naruto says. “I’ve heard about this from Shikamaru.”

 

“...Who?”

 

Naruto turns to face Sasuke and frowns, gesturing. “You know…? Nara Clan heir? Really lazy? Sleeps a lot in the back of the classroom?”

 

“Oh.” Sasuke blinks, and remembers. Pineapple head. He turns to Naruto. “So? What is this?”

 

Naruto swallows and confesses like it’s something to be feared: “Fan club.”

 

Oh. It is something to be feared. Sasuke feels his face paling. “Oh no.”

 

“Oh yes,” Naruto hisses, and then glances at the girls. They’re still gushing. Good. He catches Sasuke’s eye and jerks his head in the direction of market. “On my count, we run. Ready?”

 

Sasuke nods.

 

“One...two…”

 

They bolt, sandals slapping on the dirt path as they lug themselves and their backpacks out of there. A squawk behind them tells the girls have noticed and have given chase. Naruto’s heart races as he turns a corner and makes his way towards the market, hoping to lose them in the crowd.

Just as they pass an alleyway, Sasuke’s hand wraps around the back of Naruto’s shirt and tugs him into the darkened passage. Naruto squawks and Sasuke slaps a hand over his mouth, hiding them both behind a large bin.

 

They wait with baited breath for the girls to pass the mouth of the alleyway, only relaxing when their shrill voices disappear into the din of the crowd.

 

“Holy shit…” Naruto whispers, and slumps against the wall.

 

Sasuke rubs at his temples, his eyes shut as if in pain. “Why…?”

 

“We’re just too dashing, brother,” Naruto sighs dramatically, throwing a hand over his forehead.

 

Sasuke slugs him in the arm.

 

 

 

 

Naruto makes friends easily, Sasuke notices. His smiles have started to come out again, and though they’re not as bright as they were before, they’re still nice. They’re real, too.

Naruto’s gained weight back. He looks healthy.

 

It’s been three years now. Sasuke turned eleven last month. Watching Naruto talk softly with Shikamaru Nara under the bows of an oak tree, he can’t help but notice the passage of time.

Can’t help but notice how little time has passed.

 

Sasuke doesn’t want to feel resentment, but…

 

It’s been hard—to make friends. To really look at people again. To see past their inherent fragility, the give of skin under a blade, the way blood smells when it hits the air. People look at him and he swears they can hear him think it. They become tense and wary, and don’t know how to act. Sasuke doesn’t have Naruto’s smiles to put them at ease.

 

Sasuke doesn’t know what’s wrong with him.

 

He pulls his head into his hands and closes his eyes.

 

As if on cue, Naruto looks over and excuses himself, walking over to Sasuke to nudge him on the shoulder.

 

“You okay?” he says.

 

Sasuke nods, and keeps his head in his hands. Then he shakes his head.

 

“Do you want to go home?” Naruto asks.

 

Sasuke looks up, focusing on the grass in front of him. “Yeah.”

 

“Okay.”

 

 

 

 

 

They graduate with a tie for top spot, naturally.

Their test results are so perfectly matched that Iruka has three other instructors check them for cheating. Not a sign.

He sighs and stamps the two report cards with a golden seal.

 

They sit either side of him in the class photo. Sakura is a little ways back—not a perfect score in everything, but a damn near legendary one in chakra manipulation. Iruka was expecting that.

He knows they’re slated to be a team, and the thought fills him with a weird, slippery feeling. Is he proud? Concerned? Worried for their next instructor, who will no doubt be putting up with a lot more now that they’re grown?

Iruka shakes his heads clear of his thoughts and smiles for the photographer.

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Alright,” says Kakashi, staring them down with as much boredom as he can muster. “Why don’t you introduce yourselves, one at a time.”


	3. Wave

There’s something wrong with the Wave mission, but Naruto doesn’t yet know what it is. He glances at his brother, then at Sakura, but neither of them look like they’re thinking much about it. He even flashes a glance at Kakashi, though he’s not been able to crack the man’s mask just yet.

 

He’s good at listening to people, at knowing what they think. He’s been doing it for Sasuke for years now, when his brother is too stuck in his own head to talk like a human. Before that, his… well, the Uchiha always needed a little more patience to connect to than most. He may not be good enough to read the more elusive shinobi just yet, but Naruto has had a lifetime of practice with regular folk.

 

So when they meet Tazuna for the first time, he clocks immediately that the man is ringing. About what, Naruto doesn’t know—he just feels a warning bell go off in his head and stay there. He watches the old man talk about the bridge, the bandits on the road, and afterwards he pulls Sasuke aside.

 

“He’s lying.”

 

“What?” Sasuke twists in his grip.

 

“Tazuna,” says Naruto, nodding at the closed door of the briefing room. “He was acting weird.”

 

Sasuke blinks and presses his lips together. “Are you sure?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Okay,” says Sasuke, and then repeats, “Okay.” He clenches his hands into fists, and thinks. Then, he looks up and lowers his voice. “We keep this to ourselves. I’m sure Kakashi knows what’s going on.”

 

Naruto frowns, but let’s his silence speak his agreement.

 

 

 

He packs extra weapons in his pouch, and watches as Sasuke does the same.

They fall asleep reciting all the jutsu they’ve learned over the last few years, in stolen snippets from library scrolls and with Sasuke’s infant Sharingan.

 

 

 

When the bandits ambush them on the road, they’re almost ready. Kakashi’s blood is splattered all over the ground in front of them. They don’t look at it.

When one of the bandits targets Naruto, Sasuke pins the chains of their scythe to a tree and calls for Naruto to send a wind jutsu their way. It’s not enough to damage them, but—

They’ve forgotten about the second bandit, who rushes at Tazuna. Sakura steps in, clutching a kunai in front of her and screaming out a warning. Naruto gets to them first, shielding both with his body.

For a moment, Sasuke’s heart stops. The bandit’s knife is coming right at Naruto’s chest. Blue eyes widen in fear.

 

Kakashi appears in a cloud of white smoke, knocking the bandit out viciously.

 

Sasuke lets go of a breath he didn’t realise he was holding.

A substitution jutsu.

Of course.

To his right, the dismembered body of Kakashi’s clone turns into scattered logs. Sasuke tries to forget the visceral sight of exposed organs.

 

While Kakashi commends them all on their quick reactions and explains how he knew the bandits were coming—a puddle, of all things, on a sunny day—Sasuke’s hands itch to check Naruto over for injuries. Sakura is fine, Tazuna is fine, he’s glanced them over briefly.

 

“I’m alright,” Naruto whispers.

 

“Something you want to say, Naruto?” Kakashi calls out. They’d interrupted his lecture.

 

“No.”

 

Kakashi’s eye narrows. “Well, then. Let’s walk on.”

 

 

 

The boat ride to Tazuna’s village allows for some of the tension to fade, right up until Kakashi demands Tazuna explain what the mission is truly about. With a sigh, the old man reveals everything: the violence, the threats, and the crime boss Gatou’s iron grip over his village. As the story unfolds, Kakashi’s eye becomes narrower and narrower.

 

Their boatman is nervous—he’s taken too much of a chance even getting them here. They take an inland route and land under the cover of some mangrove trees, deciding to walk the rest of the way.

The whole time, they’re on edge. Sasuke and Naruto walk close together, at the back, and twitch at every sound.

 

Sakura is the one to notice the snow hare. It jumps out onto the path right in front of her, causing her to screech and barrel into Tazuna.

Naruto and Sasuke have their kunai out in a flash, ready to stab at anything that comes near them. When they finally process the small shivering animal, though, they’re less than pleased.

 

“It’s… just a rabbit?” Naruto hisses, staring at the thing like it’ll sit up straight and give an answer.

 

Sakura bursts into a stream of apologies, her face growing pink to match her hair.

 

Sasuke’s eyes are fixed on Kakashi. While Sakura apologises to Tazuna, he nudges Naruto and nods at their teacher.

Kakashi’s stance is wary, his gaze fixed somewhere in the canopy above him.

He’s waiting, they realise.

 

“Everyone, take cover!”

 

They drop, and a giant sword whizzes over their heads, lodging with a deafening thunk into a nearby tree. In the next heartbeat, they’re back on their feet, heads whirling until they catch sight of the new arrival on the scene. The man makes their hearts drop.

 

He’s dangerous, and that’s the first thing they can tell. There’s something in his stance that reminds them of…

 

Kakashi cocks his head and drawls out, “Well, well… If it isn’t Momochi Zabuza.”

 

Sakura’s head perks up. Sasuke’s eyes dart to her. She knows something.

 

Kakashi moves into a fighting pose, and the three of them tense in preparation, kunai at their chests.

 

“Stay back, kids,” Kakashi murmurs. “This one is on a different plane from our previous opponents.” His hand drifts to his headband, hooking under the dark cloth and pulling. “If I have to face him—” He’s saying this to himself. “—it better be like this.”

 

 

 

Later, they’ll remember only flashes of the fight.

 

The mist, the echoing voice of Zabuza, the terrible bloodlust that froze them all to the ground. Kakashi’s cheerful smile, so inappropriate for the situation, as he promised that he wouldn’t let them die. Standing in a ragged circle around Tazuna and waiting for Zabuza to strike. Kakashi trapped in the water prison, suffocating, suffocating. The desperate plan, the victory, the arrival of the creepy masked stranger.

 

“He didn’t have eyebrows,” Naruto mutters, staring at the ground as he walks.

 

“Who?” says Sakura.

 

“He’s right,” Sasuke adds, though he’s not sure what he’s supporting. He feels numb.

 

Tazuna is carrying Kakashi over his shoulder, thankfully quiet. Sasuke doesn’t know if he’ll be able to stop himself from stabbing the man if he opens his mouth. Naruto nearly died today. They all nearly did.

 

Thoughts of violence have him casting his mind back, to the start of the fight. He remembers the icy shock he felt seeing Kakashi’s eye…

The Sharingan.

 

For a bitter, dreadful moment, Sasuke thought he had family again. Blood. A long-lost cousin, spared by that terrible night. He looked at Kakashi’s face in a new light, searching for similarities, genetic quirks, anything. But it was only his eyes… The endless spinning tomoe, circling, circling.

 

“Sasuke,” Naruto whispers.

 

Sasuke jerks out of his thoughts.

 

They’ve dropped a fair bit back behind Sakura and Tazuna, walking slower and slower until they’ve come to a halt.

 

Naruto puts a hand on Sasuke’s shoulder, leaning in to look him in the eye. “Are thinking about…?”

 

Sasuke swallows and nods.

 

“Me too.”

 

He realises that Naruto must feel the same way.

 

“Do you think…?” Naruto asks.

 

Sasuke shakes his head. “No. He doesn’t look like an Uchiha.”

 

“His eyelid had a scar,” Naruto adds quietly.

 

“What?”

 

Naruto traces a line down from his forehead to the middle of his cheek. “Like this.” His expression grows dark. “Maybe he stole it.”

 

Naruto’s anger is reflected in Sasuke’s face too. They stare at each other and struggle to control it, both of them thinking violent thoughts. The idea of it, of having your family taken from you and then potentially desecrated like this… It sits badly with the both of them.

 

“Let’s wait it out,” Sasuke says, voice rough. “Let’s see what he has to say.”

 

 

 

They listen to Tazuna’s grandson Inari deride heroes, and say nothing.

Sakura, oddly, is the one to snap at him in the end, for throwing away his father’s sacrifice like that. When Inari cries, she falters and apologises.

 

 

 

Kakashi teaches them tree-walking.

 

The bark explodes under their feet when they try, shooting them back. They grit their teeth and shout challenges at each other until they’ve at least managed to stick to the trunk.

Sakura watches them from the first branch up, giggling. Her face is red again, and she’s swinging her feet like she can’t decide whether to help them or gloat. Naruto hopes it’s the former—she still likes them, right? She thinks they’re cute?

 

He’s wrong.

Getting stuck on a team of crushes must’ve really dulled her to their charms. She only says a few encouraging words to Naruto before leaving them to their own devices, a happy spring in her step.

 

Naruto takes that as a victory anyway, and sticks his tongue out at Sasuke, bragging that she likes him better. Sasuke slugs him in the arm and tries to walk up the tree again.

 

 

 

The attack comes from nowhere.

 

One minute, they’re on the bridge, giving the construction workers enough time to leave safely. The next, they’re surrounded by mist so thick it makes them choke.

 

“Get ready,” Kakashi barks at them, pulling out his kunai. “They’re coming!”

 

All four of them drop into a crouch, backs to each other, eyes fixed on the impenetrable mist. The temperature drops rapidly, the cold digging into their skin and making their hearts race. Tenzou, the luckless bastard, is with them again, locked inside the four-man grid they’ve formed.

 

From the fog, a growling voice comes: “It’s been a while, Kakashi…”

 

Naruto’s head whips towards the sound, eyes narrowing. His kunai makes a clink as he readjusts it. _Zabuza_.

 

The voice continues: “And I see you’ve brought your brats too.” The voice stops, as if thinking. Then it comes from another place. “Look, the little boy is trembling again, poor thing…”

 

It takes a second for Naruto to realise that Zabuza is talking about Sasuke. Naruto feels a spark of concern, and takes a half-step closer to him, comforting.

 

It’s unnecessary. Sasuke rolls his shoulders back and drawls, “I’m shaking with eagerness for a rematch.”

 

Zabuza lets out a startled laugh, and Naruto tries to pinpoint his location again. He can’t—it’s like the man is nowhere and everywhere at once. It’s driving him crazy.

 

“I’m getting tired of this asshole,” Naruto hisses, and Sasuke already knows what Naruto is about to do because he steps back just in time. “Fuuton: Breath of the Forest!”

 

An explosion of air blasts away the mist around them, revealing seven of Zabuza’s clones. For a brief moment, Naruto wishes he hadn’t done that. Suddenly the fight seems much more close at hand, and he doesn’t know if he’s ready for it. The last time was all luck, all element of surprise that allowed them to escape with their lives. What if this time that wouldn’t be enough?

 

“My turn,” Sasuke says, and launches into a rapid attack. Naruto barely even has time to blink before Sasuke has raced all the way around them, kunai in both hands. Blood arches wherever he passes, and bursts of white smoke follow as Zabuza’s clones disperse.

Sasuke lands beside him soon, breathing heavily.

 

Kakashi eyes the two of them with something like surprise, and they stare back vehemently, daring him to say something.

 

Instead, Kakashi just nods faintly. “I...Good work, boys.”

 

Sakura’s cry of, “ _Kakashi!_ ” draws their attention back to the fight. They face in Sakura’s direction and finally see what she’s looking at: Zabuza, standing casual and untouched at the other end of the bridge, and the creepy masked guy from before waiting beside him.

 

Ah, thinks Naruto, as the pieces of the puzzle drop into place. That explains why Zabuza isn’t dead.

 

Zabuza and the Mask exchange some quiet words before Zabuza turns to them and calls out, “Hey, Kakashi…” They can see the smirk under his facewraps even from here. “Bad choice, not leaving anyone with the old man’s family like that.”

 

Tazuna’s face goes white. They all freeze, the realisation dropping like cold water over them. It’s true. They’ve left Inari and his mother undefended, assuming that they’d be safe in the town. They should’ve remembered that Gatou was an underhanded bastard.

 

“Naruto,” Kakashi barks. “Go secure the family, they’re at the market—”

 

“No.”

 

Kakashi’s head turns to face him. This is no time for fucking insubordination. “... _Excuse me_?”

 

Naruto remains stubborn. “You’re going to get Sasuke fight the Mask,” he whispers, and sees that it’s true even as he says it. “We’re better together.” He wants to stay with his brother.

 

“Naruto—” Kakashi growls.

 

“I’ll go,” Sakura blurts, startling them both.

 

There’s no time to argue. Kakashi breaks of his staring contest with Naruto and nods at Sakura. “Good. Go.”

 

Sakura sprints off without a word, disappearing into a speck of pink. Across the bridge, Zabuza watches their little fight with acidic amusement.

 

Kakashi turns back to the two boys and jerks his head at the Mask. “Since you two insisted…” His tone is steely. Briefly, Naruto wonders if they’ve pissed off their teacher for good. Screw him if they did.

 

He shoots one look at Sasuke to make sure they’re on the same page and shoots off. Through the wind in his ears, he hears Zabuza laugh, and sees the Mask jump into a sprint, meeting them head on.

 

Naruto skids to a stop, sucks in a huge lungful of air, and screams, “Fuuton: Jet Bullet!”

 

The Mask vaults into the air, avoiding the stream of air deftly, and lands right in front of Sasuke. They launch into a rapid flurry of kunai blows, the space around them ringing with the high-pitched squeal of clashing metal.

 

Naruto clenches his teeth and summons up a few water clones. One of them falls apart, and Naruto snarls, twisting his fingers into the seal again and forcing all of his concentration into it. The clone appears stable. He sends them in, watching for Sasuke’s moves and then adding to them.

 

The Mask tuts and leaps back, out of the way of their blows. Naruto takes the opportunity to jump to Sasuke’s side.

 

“You’re fast,” says the Mask to Sasuke. “But can you counter _this?_ ”

 

 

 

Sakura gets to Tazuna’s house just in time to punt Inari out of the way of a bandit’s sword and take the man on herself.

 

She crouches low, waits for the blade to whistle overhead, and then takes the man out with a few viciously-thrown shuriken. They sink deep, slicing down to bone. The man screams like a stuck pig, and Sakura has to fight down a smile. It’s unladylike, but damn, she’s feeling bloodthirsty right now.

The second bandit, jerked out of his stupor, charges at her. She has to twist hard to avoid him, and then catches him in the ankle with a kunai.

 

 _There,_ says Inner Sakura, _cut his Achilles._ Sakura slices, and the man goes down. How on earth did she remember that?

 

Two more well-placed kicks to their heads knock the bandits unconscious, and a hush settles over their little battlefield. Sakura breathes hard, feeling her heartbeat in her chest like a drum.

 

“Sa—Sakura?”

 

She turns, and sees Inari approaching her with wide eyes. She tries for a smile.

 

“You okay?” she says.

 

He nods dumbly.

 

Then, Sakura remembers what the boy was about to do, before she’d gotten there. He had thrown himself in front of his mother to protect her.

 

“Hey,” Sakura says, her voice gentle.

 

“Yeah?”

 

“You did good, kid,” she says, and her hand runs in his hair. She’s moving on autopilot. “You’re a hero.”

 

Inari’s eyes swell with tears.

 

 

 

The water beneath their feet explodes into the air, forming a ball of icy shards around them. Naruto’s breath catches in his throat.

 

“ _Jump!_ ” Sasuke screeches, and Naruto obeys without a thought. Just like they practiced, just like they practiced. He forces every ounce of chakra into his feet and shoots up into the air.

 

The ice spears strike into the ground they were on a moment ago, but there’s no time to think about that. Twisting around each other in the air, Sasuke and Naruto send shuriken spinning towards the Mask’s moving form. None of them hit, but they’ve forced him to retreat.

They land ineligantly, knees wobbling, but at least they don’t fall. One glance to check the other is okay, and they’re off again.

The Mask parries them both with graceful ease. They can’t see his hands moving, but he hasn’t landed a hit on either of them yet.

 

Somehow, in the flurry of arms and legs and kunai, Naruto’s foot connects with something solid. He blinks in shock, and then the Mask’s body is sailing away from him, through the air, and landing at Zabuza’s feet.

 

“Haku!” Zabuza barks.

 

“Naruto,” Sasuke breathes, and sends him a nod of congratulations. Naruto has one second to feel grateful before they’re at the ready again. This isn’t over.

 

The Mask— _Haku_ —twists and jumps back onto his feet. There’s a crack running through his mask, right down the centre. Somehow, it makes him look even creepier.

 

“Enough games,” they hear him say. “I don’t want to kill you, but…”

 

Haku’s hands flash into a series of seals, and the air around Naruto and Sasuke warps. They step back, gritting their teeth. No. Not the air. It’s _ice_. Sheets of ice forming a cage around them.

 

Naruto feels Sasuke’s back press against his, and doesn’t have to look to know there’s a grimace on Sasuke’s face.

 

“Katon,” Naruto whispers.

 

“I know,” Sasuke replies, his hands twisting into a rat seal. Fire bursts from his mouth, engulfing the ice in front of him, but they can hear Zabuza’s laugh even as the fire dwindles. The ice isn’t burning.

 

“Not that easy, little brats,” Zabuza calls out gleefully.

 

The last bits of flame die away, and they notice something in the ice: Haku. An image of him on every surface of the ice. They press harder into each other’s back, gritting their teeth. What fresh hell is this?

 

“We should break them,” Sasuke hisses, his eyes glancing from one ice sheet to the next. He feels Naruto nod behind him.

 

They try that, launching into the air and hurtling as hard they can at the sheets. It doesn’t work. They sound they make bouncing off them is dull and painful, echoing around the bridge and making their ears ring. They land back in the centre, panting, with more bruises than they started with.

 

“Shit!” Naruto yells, punching the ground.

 

Haku laughs. It reverberates around them, chilling. “Hit it as hard as you want—this ice is part of my bloodline limit. It will never shatter.”

 

Sasuke growls and straightens, pulling Naruto up.

 

Distantly, they hear Kakashi’s voice. It sounds angry and terse, and is answered by Zabuza. They can’t hear what the words are, only that they’re followed by a whoosh of air and the sounds of clashing metal. Their teacher must have finally engaged Zabuza, then.

 

Suddenly, Naruto cries out and drops onto his knee. Sasuke spins around, eyes wide, searching for Naruto’s wound.

There—his kneecap, pierced clean through by a senbon as long as Sasuke’s forearm. He gags and stumbles forward, trying to figure out where it came from.

 

There’s a piercing pain in his back, and now there’s a senbon in the meat of his shoulder.

 

“Pay attention, Sasuke!” Naruto snarls.

 

Sasuke hisses, jerks the senbon out, and throws it to the side. They hear Haku’s echoing laugh again, and have just a moment to blink before more senbon are whistling towards them. Sasuke feels Naruto shove him away before jumping himself, and they skid on the damp ground. The senbon rain down with tinny plinks around them, but their skin is numb. They can’t tell yet if they’re hurt or not.

 

Sasuke looks over at Naruto and chokes, “Naruto!” There’s senbon all up and down Naruto’s back, dangerously close to his spine. One wrong move, one dodgy hit, and Naruto will never walk again. Sasuke thinks he tastes blood, and he unclenches his jaw, letting his bitten tongue breathe.

 

Naruto’s head comes up, and in his eyes is the same horror. Sasuke can’t feel his back because there are needles in it, and in his arms too, his legs. One senbon is stuck in his neck, both ends shiny with black blood.

 

Sasuke hears a horrifyingly familiar whistle, and just has enough time to scream, “ _Watch out!_ ” before he’s throwing himself over Naruto. Senbon lance into him from every angle, driving deep into his back and chest and _he can’t breathe anymore_ but he stays curled over Naruto because this is the only thing he can do.

 

As soon as that, it’s over.

 

Naruto jerks away. Sasuke can see the whites of his eyes around the blue iris. Naruto screams.

 

Sasuke can’t feel his body. He can’t feel anything.

There’s a jolt that runs through his spine, and he’s on his knees on the ground.

 

“ _Sasuke!_ ”

 

“Naruto,” he gritts out, and more blood than sound comes out. “ _Go._ ”

 

 

 

Kakashi feels heat on his face.

He turns to the right.

 

Red chakra burns.

 

 

 

Zabuza feels it when Haku’s chakra signature cuts out for good, a little blip against a maelstrom.

 

His cuts out soon after via an unparried chidori to the chest.

 

 

 

Sakura chokes on the malice emanating from the ice cage. It burns her throat all the way down, settling like poisonous fog in the depth of her lungs.

She grabs Tazuna and runs, forgetting about everything else. She just _runs_.

 

 

 

 

 

_Ru to_

_Na u To_

_NARUTO_

He jerks awake with a gasp, rolls over, and vomits onto the ground. The acid burns more than usual coming up. He doesn’t stop until his stomach is empty, until it hurts from the force of his heaving. He opens his eyes and sees black clumps, mingling with bile. He can’t taste what it is. He can’t taste anything.

 

“Naruto, _can you hear me?_ ”

 

“Yes!” he wheezes, coughing.

 

It’s Kakashi’s voice, he realises. It’s never sounded like this before. Almost close to panic.

 

Naruto turns his face towards the sound and blinks against the light, hissing in pain. It pierces through his head worse than the senbon. He’s never been this tired in his life, so much so that his muscles feel foreign to him. His skin burns.

 

“Your seal leaked, Naruto,” Kakashi says, though Naruto has to concentrate to understand the words. “Do you know what that means?”

 

“No.”

 

Kakashi curses, and Naruto tunes him out. There’s a thought niggling in the back of his head like an eel, slippery, and—

 

“Sasuke!”

 

—There’s the rage again, familiar; he felt is before, when Sasuke was— When Naruto’s vision went red and he could smell nothing but blood— _Rage_ —

 

“He’s alive, Naruto!” Kakashi yells. “Naruto!”

 

Naruto snaps his teeth together and moves like an animal, head whirling to find his brother. Every second that he can’t, the red fury in him rises. He can taste it in the back of his throat, acrid—

 

_There._

Sasuke. Breathing. Sakura, kneeling over him. Watching Naruto with horror.

 

It’s like water tipping over his head, washing everything away.

Naruto bolts towards them, skidding to a stop and dropping to his knees with a strangled cry of grief. His hands fly out to run over Sasuke’s chest, to feel him breathe and hear his heart beat.

 

“Naruto, you—” Sakura chokes.

 

Then the stench of blood hits him. Naruto looks down, at his hands, and they’re covered in guts up to his elbows. There’s so much viscera under his nails that they’ve gone black and crooked. He’s seen this sight before, once. He feels more vomit rising in his throat.

 

“What happened?”

 

Kakashi’s voice startles him badly. “You killed him.”

 

“ _Who?_ ”

 

He doesn’t need an answer to that. He’s already seen it—there, at the other end of the bridge. A body mangled as if by an animal. Shattered shards of porcelain lie beside it.

 

Naruto’s eyes water. “Wh—why did I do that?”

 

“You thought Sasuke was dead,” Sakura whispers, and it sounds like she’s trying to reassure him. Or is she trying to reassure herself? She sounds scared. Naruto doesn’t like it.

 

“I—”

 

“We need to go, kids,” says Kakashi.

 

The soft words make Naruto’s throat catch. He’s too shocked right now to cry, to concentrate on anything but a few scattered words and the tightness in his chest, but he knows he’ll break later. It happened before, after Itachi. He feels it build inside him.

 

“Please,” he says, and he doesn’t know what he’s asking for.

 

Kakashi does.

 

He picks up Sasuke and lets Naruto hold his limp hand as they walk away from the bridge.

 

 

 

Sasuke wakes up in a few hours. Naruto sobs until he loses all feeling in his face, and promises that nothing will ever harm Sasuke like that again. Sasuke’s hand curls into Naruto’s hair, and Naruto knows the promise is echoed.

 

 

 

They leave before the bridge is named. All four don’t much care, and are grateful to leave it behind.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sarutobi waits for the three genin to exit before tilting his head towards Kakashi.

 

“How are you finding them?” he asks.

 

Kakashi is still staring at the door. His pose is lax and comfortable, his hands in the pockets of his trousers, but Sarutobi has known him long enough to pick out signs of tension.

 

“They’re…” Kakashi pauses to find the words. “...Protective of each other.”

 

Sarutobi hums, understanding that Kakashi isn’t talking about Sakura. “They’ve been through a lot. It’s expected.”

 

Kakashi turns to him and explains, “There was an incident of insubordination.”

 

“Ah,” says Sarutobi. He taps his pipe on his desk and then puts it back in his mouth, biting down. “They’re both valuable to the village.” _Accommodate them, Kakashi._

 

“They’re soldiers,” Kakashi insists. _They should follow orders._

 

“Even soldiers have familial loyalties,” Sarutobi says, folding his hands under his chin. “Give them time.”

 

Kakashi looks back at the door through which his students left. The Hokage’s office grows dark with dusk.

 

“I’m not sure time will be enough,” he murmurs.


	4. Exams

“I think I’m going to enter them in the Chuunin exams,” says Kakashi, leaning back against a fence as they watch Gai’s team spar.

 

“Yosh!” Gai replies, sticking up his thumb. “I wish you well then, my eternal rival!”

 

 

 

 

 

Sakura doesn’t want to ask Kakashi and the Hokage, because she thinks they’re going to lie to her. She’s always been very aware of her place in the ranks, of her age and perceived intelligence. She’s not cleared for such information.

 

So she finds it out for herself instead—red chakra, immense power, a howl like wind in the mountains. The picture of a gigantic fox looks up at her from the pages of a dusty scroll, and next to it is a list of names. She squints at them and recognises none. Not at first.

 

“What’s that you have there, Miss Haruno?” the old librarian says.

 

Sakura rolls the scroll shut and smiles innocently. “Nothing, Miss Honomura. Wrong scroll.”

 

“You might want to look over there,” says Honomura, and points away. “This section is all about summonings and chakra beasts. You said you were looking for flower meanings?”

 

No, Sakura said she was looking for genjutsu manuals. Flower meanings she was looking for last month. She doesn’t correct Honomura, only nods again and bows.

 

 _Chakra beasts,_ she thinks later, when she’s dragging her eyes across a useless page about magnolias and seeing none of it. _Jinchuuriki._

They do D-Rank after D-Rank after D-Rank, sweating in the gathering heat of summer. Kakashi is always in the background of each of these memories, leaning against a wall with his orange book out. The first time Naruto gets a good look at the cover, he wrinkles his nose so hard he almost hears Mother say, ‘ _Don’t do that, it’ll get stuck’._ Sasuke claps him on the back to get him moving again.

 

“Did you see his book?” Naruto hisses.

 

“Yes,” Sasuke hisses back, shoveling with his whole back put into it. “Don’t look at it.”

 

Sakura walks past them, dead on her feet. “Is this about the book?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Let’s burn it.”

 

Naruto’s estimation of Sakura goes up a couple more notches. She’s been a champ these last few weeks—her crush on them is well and truly dead. He doesn’t know why, doesn’t want to ask, but he’s grateful. A little. Maybe. He’s also a little...hurt?

 

The first few days after they’d gotten back from Wave, she’d stared at him with a weird look in her eye that made his skin crawl. One afternoon, she disappeared for a couple of hours. After that, she didn’t look at him strangely again. A week later, she even poked fun at him, startling him so badly he’d fallen out of a tree. Tora the Noblewoman’s cat yowled and fell too.

It was the first time Sasuke laughed since they’d come back, too, so Naruto took it with grace.

 

 

 

 

 

The afternoon Sarutobi and Kakashi get Sasuke and Naruto into their office is bad. They explain the seal on Naruto’s stomach, the one they were resolutely _not_ discussing for the last month. The red chakra. The menace rolling off Naruto in waves. The way Sakura flinched away from him, the first time he spoke to her afterwards.

 

They go back to their apartment and Naruto breaks.

 

“I’m a—” He can’t find enough air to breathe. His chest grows tighter until he can cry from the pain. “—I’m a _monster_. I’m a—”

Of course, he always knew, in some way. Sasuke knew. Ita— _he_ must have known too. That Naruto was strange, weird, different.

 

“Hey!” Sasuke snaps, grabbing him roughly by the shoulders and turning to face him. “ _Hey!_ You’re not a monster—you’re my brother!” He shakes Naruto viciously. “Snap out of it!”

 

Naruto struggles to free himself from Sasuke’s grip. “You should get away,” he whispers.

 

Sasuke flinches back, but keeps his grip on Naruto’s shirt. He leans in close and waits until Naruto drags his attention to him before hissing, “Get your shit together, Naruto.”

His fists tremble, and he doesn’t know how to stop them.

 

“ _Sasuke_ —”

 

“Get your shit together!” Sasuke snarls, glaring Naruto right in the eyes. They’re wide, the pupils tiny terrified pricks. He notices tears gathering in the corner. With incredible effort, Sasuke lowers his voice and hisses, “Come on, Naruto.”

 

Naruto swallows. His hands have come up to grip Sasuke’s. He can’t tell whose shaking worse.

 

“Okay,” Naruto breathes.

 

“Good.” Sasuke doesn’t let him go.

 

Naruto shudders, and one by one, his muscles relax. He sags like a ragdoll in Sasuke’s grip, and Sasuke pulls him in for a hug. Naruto is heavy and warm. Sasuke’s arms tighten around him painfully.

 

“You’re okay,” Sasuke whispers.

 

“I’m okay.”

 

 

 

 

 

Their manoeuvres become smoother, but they still struggle to work as a team. Kakashi watches from the edges of the training grounds, in the shade of a willow, as they run through another squad formation.

 

Sasuke is too precise, unwilling to waste even a drop of excess chakra to the point where some of his jutsu dissipate before he’s even cast them. His footsteps are too hesitant.

 

Naruto is the opposite—too brash. His stamina exceeds the delicate framework of his hand seals and makes his techniques collapse in on themselves. He’s clearly spent time with the books. It’s his sense of his own chakra is lacking.

 

Sakura is a mix of the both of them. Her chakra control is near perfect, extraordinary for her age, but she doesn’t push herself to find its limits. She’s too content with what she has, and it drives Kakashi mad.

 

They’re all driving him mad.

 

 

 

 

 

Konohamaru is… Konohamaru. He’s standing with his feet wide apart, scarf trailing behind him, blocking Sasuke and Naruto’s path. His face is stuck in that stubborn little grimace that they can already recognise as trouble. Behind him, his two friends watch cautiously.

 

Sasuke leans down with his arms crossed. “What do you want, brat?”

 

“Play ninja tag with us!” Konohamaru yells, pointing.

 

“No,” says Sasuke.

 

Konohamaru stomps his foot and barks out, “Why not?”

 

“’Cause we’ve got better things to do, kid,” says Naruto. He pats Konohamaru on the head and brushes past him. “Go bother your teacher.”

 

Behind them, Konohamaru looks like he’s going to cry from pure rage. His little friends watch Naruto and Sasuke retreat with confused glances.

 

“I thought you said they were cool?” Moegi whispers to Konohamaru.

 

“They are!” he insists back. He stomps his foot again, a little unsure. “They are…”

 

Sasuke and Naruto can still hear him. They pretend they can’t. They’re not very good at it.

 

Naruto leans in to Sasuke and mutters, “The guilt is killing me.”

 

Sasuke replies, equally chagrined, “How does he _do_ that?”

 

“Genetics?” Naruto sighs back, stopping. He looks up. “The Hokage’s pretty good at this too.”

 

Sasuke grits his teeth and turns around on his heel, slowly. His eyes are shut like he’s trying to control a headache.

 

Konohamaru, Moegi, and Udon perk up.

 

Sasuke barks, “Scram!”

 

With a screech of delight, the three kids bolt away. Sasuke and Naruto run after them.

 

Ninja tag is a pretty easy game—one party runs, the other chases. All ninjutsu tricks are allowed, seeing as the participants are usually kids without that many tricks anyway. A great little way to build up stamina and train escape skills.

 

The first time Konohamaru goaded Naruto and Sasuke into tag wasn’t friendly at all—he’d gotten into an argument with them and then snatched one of Sasuke’s kunai before bolting away. The brothers had given chase and gotten it back in the end, but they were still embarrassed by the memory. They were genin, after all. Too advanced to be tricked by a pre-Academy brat like that.

 

The three kids turn down into side alleys, jumping over bins and piles of empty crates, bouncing off the walls like rubber balls. Left, right, left right. As unpredictable as possible.

 

With a glance at each other, Naruto and Sasuke split, intent on sandwiching the kids between them when the three emerge onto a bigger street. Sasuke jumps up on the roofs, and Naruto joins him.

 

There—the alley ends. Sasuke and Naruto speed up, landing heavily on the ground and turning, arms outstretched, to grab a kid each.

 

Moegi and Udon squeal when they see them, but Naruto and Sasuke grab them before they two kids can escape.

 

“Got you!” Naruto crows.

 

In Sasuke’s arms, Moegi yells, “No fair!”

 

“Yes fair,” Sasuke replies, avoiding a clumsy kick in the shins.

 

They’ve forgotten Konohamaru—the kid rockets out of the alleyway before either Naruto or Sasuke can grab him, and bolts out and down the street.

 

“Ha ha! Didn’t catch me!” he screeches back.

 

“Look out, dummy!” Naruto yells, but it’s too late.

 

Konohamaru runs full pelt into the legs of two strangers, going down with a yelp. Naruto and Sasuke drop Moegi and Udon, stepping forward. Who are these people? Naruto shares a glance with Sasuke.

 

The strangers glare down at Konohamaru. The one with the face-paint grunts out, “That hurt, you little shit.” He reaches down and picks up Konohamaru by the scruff.

 

Naruto and Sasuke stiffen and push Moegi and Udon behind them wordlessly.

 

The face-paint stranger continues, turning to Sasuke and Naruto, “Is this what Leaf genin like to waste their time on? No wonder you guys are so weak _._ ”

 

“Put him down,” Naruto growls.

 

“Or what?” says Face-Paint, but still, he lets Konohamaru go. Konohamaru scrambles away, hiding behind Naruto.

 

Face-Paint grins viciously and cracks his knuckles.

 

“Or we’ll show you exactly how _weak_ Leaf genin are,” Naruto replies. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Sasuke reach for a kunai.

 

The girl stranger glances at Face-Paint and murmurs, “Don’t. We’ll get yelled at later.”

 

Face-Paint ignores the warning, dropping into a stance. “I want to play a little before the boss gets here.”

 

Everyone tenses. Sasuke whips his kunai out, level to his eyes. Naruto twists his fingers into the first sign of a wind jutsu, ready to go at Face-Paint’s first move. They hold their breaths.

 

“Boys!” a voice interrupts, coming from behind Sasuke and Naruto. _Sakura._ She yells out, fake-cheerful, “Boys! You’re all cool and edgy! Could we not?”

 

Naruto risks a glance back to see a strained smile on Sakura’s face. She’s waving her hands, trying to get Face-Paint to look at her. It doesn’t work. The girl stranger, however, raises an eyebrow in Sakura’s direction.

 

Sakura gestures for Moegi, Udon, and Konohamaru to leave—which they do, scrambling over themselves to go hide behind a nearby-fence. She comes up just behind Naruto and Sasuke and hisses, “Why are you getting into a fight?”

 

Naruto whispers back sullenly, “They started it.”

 

Sakura pauses and then says, “They’re Sand.”

 

Sasuke’s eyes flicker to Face-Paint’s hitae-ate. An hourglass. She’s right. He says, “What are they doing here?”

 

The girl stranger overhears them and sniffs imperiously. “Talk about clueless. Don’t you know anything?” She flicks out a black-bordered ID card from her pocket and shows it to them. “We’re here for the Chuunin Exams.”

 

Sasuke, Sakura, and Naruto still. The three of them knew about the exam, sure, but Kakashi hasn’t said anything about it, and they hadn’t realised it was so soon.

 

Sasuke speaks up for the first time, letting his voice ring out: “That still doesn’t give you the right to harass children.”

 

Face-Paint grins mockingly, exchanging glances with the girl stranger.

 

Naruto’s temper is running dangerously close to breaking-point. He opens his mouth to snap out a retort, but he’s distracted by Sakura. She taps both him and Sasuke on the shoulder and then motions away, up into the bows of a tree behind the two strangers. Naruto looks up and shuts his mouth.

 

Another boy. Place skin, deep-set and blackened eyes, and something about him that rubs Naruto the entirely wrong way. He feels the hair on his neck stand. Sakura evidently doesn’t like him either—she’s got a tight grip on Sasuke’s and Naruto’s shoulders, and she doesn’t seem to notice.

 

The boy must realise he’s been spotted, because he bodyflickers away in a whirl of sand and lands just behind Face-Paint and the girl stranger. His blackened eyes flicker up and he breathes out, “Kankuro. Temari. You’re an embarrassment to the village.”

 

The aura in the street shifts rapidly. Face-Paint—Kankuro—loses both his bravado and the colour in his face, stepping back. “G-Gaara…”

 

Gaara straightens and steps between them. “Losing control of yourself like that… How pathetic.” He turns to Sasuke, Naruto, and Sakura. “I apologise for my siblings. They should have known better.”

 

Naruto watches Gaara wearily, still trying to figure out what the ill feeling he got from him was. In his gut, something is turning. Gaara looks at Sakura and Sasuke in turn, but when his eyes land on Naruto, they lock. Naruto stares back like a cat caught in a corner.

 

“You…” Gaara says. “What’s your name?”

 

Naruto feels his hackles rise. He doesn’t let his voice waver: “Naruto Uchiha.”

 

“Uchiha…” Gaara tries the name. He inclines his head. It didn’t look like he liked it. He says, “We’ll be going now.”

 

Sakura, Sasuke, and Naruto step aside in unison to let the three Sand Siblings through. They follow them with their eyes until they disappear around the corner. Only then do they breathe.

 

“You felt that, right?” Naruto says low.

 

Sakura glances at him and shrugs. “I don’t know what you felt, but that Gaara kid… He’s got a lot of chakra. You should be careful.”

 

Sasuke hums in agreement.

 

In the same bows of the tree behind them, unseen, a different shinobi watches. His yellow-slitted eyes narrow in thought.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They pass the first exam easily.

 

Sakura spots the genjutsu, and also aces her test, because she’s Sakura.

 

Naruto and Sasuke haven’t spent the last twelve years attached at the hip to not develop a secret code, so they get by. Sasuke’s Sharingan headache afterwards is pretty funny too.

 

They watch the Sand Siblings carefully, but nothing untoward happens. They think they’re being watched in turn.

 

 

 

 

 

The Forest of Death smells like… death. Not the best analogy Naruto ever made, but it’s right. There’s the constant stench of rot and damp that makes his head spin. He’s not even inside yet. He presses his wrist to his nose and shuts his eyes, trying to control it.

 

“You okay?” Sasuke murmurs.

 

“Yep,” Naruto wheezes out. “All under control.”

 

Sakura looks at him weirdly. She takes in a deep breath, trying to figure out what Naruto’s smelling. It’s not that bad.

 

Sasuke frowns at her and turns back to Naruto, whispering, “What’s wrong?”

 

Naruto breathes back, “Just… smell. You know. The usual.” He takes his hand away as if to prove it, though he’s still a little green.

 

Sasuke nods. It’s been like this since they were kids.

 

In front of them, Mitarashi Anko yells out instructions. Sasuke takes care to remember what the scrolls look like.

 

 

 

The first team they meet—Cloud, slightly below them in power—doesn’t have the scroll they need. Naruto looks at their Air scroll mournfully, wishing it’d just turn black.

 

They keep moving, leaving the Grass nin tied up at the base of a tree for the proctors.

 

 

 

At night, they struggle to tell the animal cries apart from the genin’s. Naruto listens the hardest and tells them after ten tense minutes that whatever battle is going on is happening a safe distance away.

 

They sleep in shifts of four hours, just like Kakashi told them to.

 

The whole time, they can’t shake the feeling that they’re being stalked. It must be part of the exam, to heighten paranoia. They try to shrug it off and don’t succeed.

 

 

 

In the forest, a conversation:

 

“Why not take them both, my Lord?”

 

“I only need the Sharingan. The fox would be too difficult to control. I don’t know how it would react to the Living Corpse Reincarnation.”

 

“And the girl?”

 

“Dispose of her, if you need to.”

 

 

 

On the third night, they come across a squad of Grass ninja, and every alarm in Naruto’s head goes off. It must have to do something with the smell again. He tries to channel chakra to his nose to enhance the sense and ends up giving himself a nosebleed.

 

“Woah, you okay?” Sakura exclaims, one eye on him and the other on their opponents.

 

“I’m fine,” he says, taking a step back and pointing at the Grass nin. “There’s something wrong with them.”

 

Before Sasuke can open his mouth and ask what Naruto means, one of the Grass nin grins and steps forward. Their voice, when they speak, is like oil: “Well _done,_ little container.”

 

Sasuke, Sakura, and Naruto freeze. They’ve never talked about Naruto’s bodily guest, not all three of them. Sasuke and Naruto think Sakura knows, but… They glance at her, and then at each other, and then at the Grass nin. How do _they_ know?

 

Sasuke takes a protective step towards Naruto.

 

The Grass nin licks their lips and says, “Now, now, no need to get so tense. I just need a word with Sasuke.” They flick their hands at their companions, barking out, “You two, go.”

 

The two nin either side rush forward. Sakura goes down with a scream, and Naruto grunts as he’s hit. All four—Grass nin and genin—disappear into the undergrowth.

 

“Naruto!” Sasuke yells.

 

“How rude,” says the Grass nin. “You should pay attention when you’re being talked to.” They slide towards Sasuke, the manic grin still on their face.

 

Then, Sasuke’s hit by pure _dread._ It makes him break out in a full-body sweat, and instantly, he knows what it is. _Killing intent._ Not the strongest he’s ever felt, not like— But he still wants to vomit. He can’t move. _He can’t move._

 

“Little Uchiha,” says the Grass nin. “I’ve waited so long to meet you.”

 

Through his rigour, Sasuke manages to grit out, “Who the _hell_ are you?”

 

The Grass nin tuts. “My name is Orochimaru,” they say, mouth unhinging to expose a serpent’s tongue. “And I’m going to give you a taste of power.”

 

Orochimaru’s head snaps towards Sasuke’s shoulder, and Sasuke screams.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the white void, he sees himself.

 

Pale, small, with fragile limbs the width of birds’ bones. A little white mourning suit. He remembers that suit. He’d burnt it.

 

He’s crying.

 

He’s six.

 

“Father and Mother needn’t have died…”

 

The Sasuke of now is frozen. He wants to step forward.

 

“Our clan was destroyed… everyone was killed…”

 

He hears the little voice inside his head and all around him. It vibrates like it wants to shatter him.

 

“… _Because you weren’t strong enough!”_

The little Sasuke claws at his eyes— _his eyes, red, spinning, spinning_ —and peels away a patch of skin. Behind it, Orochimaru stares.

 

“ _Because you’re nothing but a weakling._ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> btw.... im using the manga to help me with plot and shiz and..... some dialogue is lifted wholesale and like, yikes was that shit edgy. like the english translation is waaaaaay too edgy to be spoken by 12 year olds but thats how it is in that bitch of a world i guess.......c'est la vie narutoyenne


	5. Opponents

Sakura had learned a long time ago that if she wanted to know anything, she’d have to find it out for herself. She was a paper ninja, she was good at it.

 

Here is what she knows now—one: she’s weaker than she thought she was, and she doesn’t like it. Two: the Sound nin that had attacked her after the weird ones from Grass vanished had been given orders to _kill._ Three: there is something deeply, dangerously wrong with Sasuke.

 

As he stands there staring at the newly-arrived stranger—Kabuto—Sakura eyes the spot on his neck from which the flurry of black markings had sprouted. Yesterday. That was yesterday?

 

“What do you want?” Sasuke says.

 

Kabuto smiles. “The three of you are still missing a scroll, aren’t you?”

 

Sakura’s eyes shift to him, then. She looks him up and down. Grey hair, glasses. Fifteen years old, or so. His manner said ‘one of you’, but his chakra was muted professionally. Sakura looks back at Sasuke, at his neck.

 

Four: there was more at stake in this exam than rankings.

 

 

 

Kakashi alights silently, melting out of the shadows of the Hokage’s office. Mitarashi Anko and the ANBU Tiger and Crow are already there.

 

The Hokage inclines his head in acknowledgement. “Kakashi. You know.”

 

“About the incident in the forest?” he says. “Yes.” His little students facing off against fucking _Orochimaru._ Kakashi turns to Anko and adds, “…I may need your help in the future.” He gestures at his neck.

 

She nods. “I’m sorry about Uchiha.”

 

“Which one?” he chuckles. Then, he raises his hands with a false smile. “It wasn’t your fault.”

 

Sarutobi interrupts them with a tap of his pipe. “Kakashi, the decision is yours. Should we pull them out of the exam?”

 

Kakashi thinks for a moment. It had been almost twenty hours since the fight, and they seemed to have pulled through. Another twenty hours wouldn’t matter. He says, “No. They’ve worked hard for this—let them finish it.”

 

The two ANBU agents shift on their feet, evidently disagreeing.

 

Sarutobi harrumphs. “Very well.”

 

 

 

They fight the enemy. With perseverance, they win. They get the second scroll. They say goodbye to Kabuto and enter the tower.

 

Naruto figures out that they have to open the scrolls together, and when they do, and the summoning smoke clears, they don’t recognise the chuunin in front of them.

 

She gives them a speech—about the roles of Earth and Heaven and what a chuunin must be—and then directs them through a hallway.

 

They’re one of the last teams to arrive.

 

Sakura hangs back, letting the Uchiha brothers walk ahead of her. Suddenly, she’s unnerved. She watches Naruto and Sasuke’s figures—equally different, all the same—and feels as foreign as she ever felt in comparison. She’s a stranger then. An observer. A harbinger, sounding off the alarm. She just can’t tell why she feels the alarm in the first place. She catches the moment when the two glance at each other and share _something._ They do this, all the time, but this one it feels different. Weighted.

 

She shakes her head and pushes the thought aside, suddenly feeling silly. They’re her teammates. Sure, they’re close, but they’re brothers. Of course, they would be. They just went through one hell of a harrowing experience, nerves and heart-attacks and adrenaline included. Whatever’s wrong, it must be just that—leftover adrenaline. She shakes it off.

 

Ahead, Ino-Pig looks at her and smirks. Immediately, whatever Sakura was feeling is replaced by rivalry-fuelled rage. She’ll show Ino what’s up.

 

 

 

The Hokage explains to them that there’s going to be a Part Two to the exam, and they all kind of want to cry a little. He hands the proceedings over to a sickly-looking proctor named Hayate Gekkou.

 

Kabuto, weirdly, drops out.

 

Naruto turns quietly to Sasuke and murmurs, “Maybe you should drop out too. I’m worried about you.”

 

“Shut up,” Sasuke hisses back.

 

Hayate Gekkou finishes explaining the match-ups, blows his whistle, and the first names show up on the board. _Sasuke Uchiha versus Akado Yoroi._

Naruto grits his teeth and glares at Sasuke. “Fine. Don’t fucking die.”

 

He pushes past him, following the other students up into the observation decks.

 

Sakura spares Sasuke a look but doesn’t say anything. If he didn’t listen to Naruto, she wouldn’t have a chance of convincing him either.

 

 

 

Naruto can’t watch the fight. He can’t. He walks straight past everyone else and into the room just off the observation deck, burying his face in his hands. He’s frustrated to the point of tears, his exhaustion compounding, his fists clenching and unclenching rhythmically as he tries to control the urge to lash out. He wants to pummel something, feel something break under his hands.

 

Naruto isn’t blind—he can see that something’s been eating at Sasuke, ever since his fight with that Grass nin. _Orochimaru,_ Sasuke’d said. Naruto recognised the name, but Sasuke hadn’t, and he wouldn’t say anything else either. Why? _Why?_

 

Sasuke’s an idiot. He’s always a goddamn idiot. Ever since he was a kid, always trying out jutsu before he’s ready, always reaching for something he shouldn’t have because it’s _dangerous, Sasuke, can’t you fucking see—?_

“What are you doing here?”

 

Naruto whirls around. Kakashi is leaning in the doorway, staring intently at Naruto’s face.

 

Kakashi says, “Why aren’t you outside, cheering on your comrades?”

 

“You mean watching my idiot brother get himself killed?”

 

Kakashi hums. “Yes. I guess that’s another way to put it.”

 

Naruto growls and turns away, pacing. How else can he deal with Sasuke’s stubbornness? He won’t listen, he won’t learn, he won’t take his fucking foot of the pedal for long enough to see that he’s ricocheting into a dead end. Naruto’s thoughts turn viciously to his useless teacher.

 

Her rounds on Kakashi and spits, “Why didn’t you stop him? You didn’t even try!”

 

Kakashi shrugs. “It wasn’t my place. It was his choice.” He peers at Naruto pointedly. “You should respect it, too.”

 

“ _Respect it?”_ Naruto snarls. “He’s one wrong hit away from a coma and you’re telling me to _respect it?”_ He isn’t even angry at Kakashi, but he can’t stop. “You should do better! You’re our fucking teacher, and you’re _useless!”_

 

“ _Naruto,”_ Kakashi snaps.

 

Naruto balks, suddenly remembering his place.

 

As quickly as it came, Kakashi’s anger goes. He says, then, low, “You anger is borne of fear, Naruto. Let it go.” Then, even quieter. “Sasuke is going to be fine. He won’t leave you.”

 

That pierces Naruto deep. He sucks in a ragged breath, all of his anger gone too.

 

Kakashi continues, as if to a spooked animal, “You are codependent, and it’s hindering you—no, let me finish. You are _._ But you are soldiers now. You must be as good alone as you are together, which means _trusting Sasuke with his decisions,_ no matter how bad you think they are.” He looks directly into Naruto’s eyes and gestures outside, to where the sounds of the fight are getting louder. Kakashi says, carefully, “You are more use to him out there than you are here.”

 

Naruto swallows and clenches his fists at his sides.

 

Kakashi says, “Understood?”

 

Naruto says, “Understood.”

 

They pause, letting the air settle a little.

 

Kakashi claps his hands together, his perpetual smile back on his face. “Well then. Let’s go?”

 

 

 

Sasuke wins. Kakashi clasps him on the shoulder, leans in, and murmurs. “Well done. You almost gave your brother an aneurysm.”

 

Sasuke’s too wrung out to react much. He turns towards the conservation deck. “Naruto…”

 

“He’s fine,” says Kakashi. His fingers tighten on Sasuke’s shoulder and he begins to push. “You, however, are not. Let’s get _that_ taken care of.”

 

Sasuke tries to protest, but Kakashi’s already led him off the main combat floor and into a side hallway.

 

“What are you going to do?” he manages.

 

“Seal the curse mark,” Kakashi replies.

 

Sasuke balks, but Kakashi’s grip is iron. He leads them both into a deserted room filled with columns and nothing else. In the centre is a rough circle marked out with kunai. He gestures for Sasuke to sit in the centre, and Sasuke collapses onto the floor.

 

Kakashi explains what his seal will do as he sketches it out on the floor and on Sasuke’s chest. Sasuke’s will is necessary to control it. Control the power, immense and heady, that he’d felt for those few brief moments that he’d let the curse mark loose. Even now, only after a few glimpses of it, Sasuke wants more. It terrifies him.

 

“Control it, Sasuke,” Kakashi murmurs as he pushes chakra into Sasuke’s shoulder. Sasuke tries not to scream against the sharp pain—it feels like a burning ring of fire spreading down his back, winding tighter and tighter. Kakashi says, “ _Control it._ ”

 

When it’s done, Sasuke collapses on the dusty floor, and lets unconsciousness claim him.

 

 

 

Hayate Gekkou blows his whistle again. More names appear on the board. Naruto’s eyes are still fixed in the direction Kakashi and Sasuke had disappeared to.

 

Beside him, Sakura gasps. “Naruto—!”

 

He looks up and his stomach drops to his knees.

 

_Uchiha Naruto versus Gaara._

“Shit,” says Naruto. To the left and to the right of him, people break out into murmur. Naruto glances across to the other observation deck and catches Kankuro’s eye. The bastard’s grinning.

 

Naruto’s distracted by a jerk to his sleeve. He turns around and sees Kiba.

 

“Be careful,” Kiba blurts out. “Those three—especially _that one—”_ Gaara. “—they’re dangerous. We saw what he did to someone, he crushed them with his sand like _this—”_ Kiba clenches his fist and Naruto flinches.

 

“I know,” he replies. “Thank you, though.”

 

Kiba nods seriously. “Good luck.”

 

He turns to Sakura, who’s pale in the face. He nods at her too, and then steps away.

 

Down in the arena, the proctor waits for both of them. Naruto throws him a glance and then turns forward, watching Gaara step forward. He doesn’t know what his strategy should be—he hasn’t seen enough of the other boy to have one. His wind jutsu won’t do much against sand, but maybe his fire will…?

 

Gaara observes him silently, blue eyes shifting from head to foot. He’s thinking. The same ill feeling, churning, pops up in Naruto’s gut. It’s like static, he decides. A gathering storm.

 

“You may begin,” says the proctor.

 

“I withdraw,” says Gaara.

 

Naruto’s jaw drops. A unified gasp rises in the observation decks, everyone leaning over the side to get a better look and make sure they hadn’t imagined it.

 

Temari yelps, “Gaara! What are you doing?”

 

He flicks a hand up to silence her, and levels a stare at Naruto. “I won’t fight you, Uchiha,” he murmurs. “Not yet.” Then, he turns on his heel and walks out of the arena.

 

Naruto watches him go, deeply confused. As Gaara leaves, his gut feeling recedes too. He doesn’t know whether to feel relief or irritation. He doesn’t like crypticism. 

 

Behind him, Hayate coughs and announces, “The match goes to Naruto Uchiha.” He blows his whistle.

 

 

 

Kakashi’s returned by the time the next match starts and Naruto makes his way back up.

 

“How is he?”

 

“He’s fine,” Kakashi replies. “He passed out, so we’ve put him in one of the medic’s rooms.”

 

“He passed out?” Naruto hisses.

 

“He’s _fine,_ ” Kakashi repeats. He repositions himself on the wall, one foot up against it and arms crossed on his chest. “Now—you. Your match.”

 

Naruto doesn’t want to let the blatant subject change slide, but Sakura jumps in with; “Yeah, why’d he quit like that?”

 

Kakashi’s eye narrows. “Strange.”

 

Sakura says, “He doesn’t seem like the kind to quit. I talked to Kiba after, I mean, during your match, and he said…” She glances at the remaining Sand Siblings on the other observation deck. “He said that they were on another level.”

 

Naruto shrugs. “I don’t know. I…” He thinks again of the weird feeling Gaara gave him. He doesn’t know if he should say it out loud.

 

Kakashi peers at him, eye still narrowed. There’s suspicion there.

 

Naruto shrugs again, wordless.

 

Sakura looks between them both and bites her lip. She’s caught without information again, and she wants nothing more than to run to the library and figure out what’s wrong. That, or throttle both Naruto and Kakashi for being so damn dramatic and secretive.

 

Down in the arena, Rock Lee is fighting another Sound nin. The Sound nin is losing.

 

 

 

Hayate blows his whistle.

 

_Haruno Sakura versus Yamanaka Ino._

Sakura lets out a breath. Naruto hums from where he’s leaning on the wall. He says, “Good luck.”

 

“Thanks,” she replies.

 

All the matches since Naruto’s have been short and to the point. One opponent always outclasses the other. It’s too easy. People are itching for a real match.

 

Sakura watches Ino descend the winding staircase into the arena and thinks. Really thinks, for the first time, of her childhood rival.

 

Ino catches Sakura’s stare and smirks. “Scared, Billboard-brow?”

 

Sakura remembers her place in that class photo, way back when they’d graduated the Academy. It feels so long ago. She’d stood just a little way back behind Iruka. She knew why she was put in that spot—average grades, except for the ones on chakra manipulation. She’d aced those tests. Prodigious, they’d said. It’s why they’d placed her on the same team as the last Uchiha and Copy-nin Kakashi.

 

“No,” Sakura replies. Ino’s face twists into a frown.

 

Ino, however, was a clan heir. She’d been trained from toddlerhood to excel, to be the strongest shinobi of her clan. Even though she wasn’t a prodigy, she was a strong opponent. She’d only get better with age, until she’d earned the mantle of clan head. Sakura would have to do her best to keep up.

 

She was also Sakura’s best friend.

 

“So,” says Ino, standing right in front of Sakura. “It’s you and me, going head to head. Never saw it coming.”

 

Sakura unties her hitae-ate and reties it on her forehead. The crowd titters. Sakura grins, letting a little bit of drama into the fight. Why not, right?

 

“Head to head?” she says. “More like foot to head, Ino-pig. Get ready to get pummelled.”

 

Ino gapes for a moment. Then, the comment catches up to her, and she screeches, “ _Pummelled?_ Don’t try and cop an attitude with me, you little cry baby! I’m gonna pummel _you!_ ”

 

Sakura laughs and drops into a stance, motioning forward with her forefingers. “Bring it on.”

 

 

 

If not for his decade in ANBU, Kakashi’s eyebrows would have disappeared into his hairline at the sight before him. His student, and Ino, merrily passed out against a wall. Ino’s hair now matched Sakura’s in length. How dramatic.

 

He thinks back. Was he this dramatic as a twelve-year-old? Probably.

 

“They’re fine,” he tells the rest of the worried pre-teens that have gathered around him. “Just exhaustion. They should wake up within the next half-hour.”

 

Beside him, Asuma sighs, looking at Ino’s hair. “She’s going to be livid.”

 

Kakashi pats his shoulder in commiseration. “Have fun.”

 

Asuma gives him the stink-eye.

 

This time, Kakashi lets Naruto follow Sakura’s stretcher into the medic hall.

 

 

 

 

 

When Sasuke wakes up, Naruto’s sitting on the foot of the bed. Sasuke looks at him blearily, his throat dry to the point of pain.

 

“You’re a real idiot, you know that?” says Naruto, handing him a cup. “Here. Water.”

 

“Thank you,” Sasuke rasps. It’s icy cold, making him shiver as he gets it down.

 

Naruto turns and sits cross-legged on the bed. His expression is hooded, and Sasuke knows that whatever news he has won’t be good.

 

“They’re separating us,” says Naruto.

 

“What?”

 

Naruto looks away. “We’ve been given a month to prepare for the third exam. They’ve assigned us opponents already, here—” He hands Sasuke a sheet of paper.

 

Sasuke peers down and finds his own name written against Neji Hyuuga. Naruto’s is in the slot to the right, slated against Shikamaru. Sasuke frowns at the missing names.

 

“Where’s—” he starts.

 

“She’s out,” Naruto says. “She fought against Ino and it ended in a draw, so she’s not competing.”

 

“What about the Sand kid?” says Sasuke. “Gaara.”

 

Naruto looks troubled. “He withdrew,” he says. “Before he even fought me.”

 

Sasuke jerks forward. “You were against him?”

 

“Yeah,” says Naruto. “It’s fine. I didn’t even fight. It’s pissing me off.”

 

Sasuke tries to get the clench of worry in his chest to loosen. He laughs instead. Of course, Naruto would get angry about not getting to compete. Then, he remembers what Naruto said at the start.

 

“Why are they separating us?” Sasuke says.

 

Naruto grits his teeth and quotes, “We must be as good alone as we are together.” At Sasuke’s questioning look, Naruto explains: “Kakashi’s idea. I think the Hokage is behind it too. You’re going somewhere with Kakashi, but they haven’t told me who my teacher will be.”

 

“Any guesses?”

 

Naruto shrugs. “As long as they help me get stronger, I don’t care.” He looks up. “I know what Orochimaru said to you.”

 

Sasuke stiffens, not expecting it. His body feels cold all of a sudden.

 

Naruto shakes his head. “Not like that. I guessed.” His smile is sardonic. “Who else could it be?”

 

_Itachi._

Sasuke’s lips thin, eyes boring into Naruto’s.

 

“Our old promise,” says Naruto.

 

Back then, on the rooftops in the night. Staring at the forest beyond the borders of the village, their thoughts going round and round until they couldn’t think anymore.

 

“Just don’t leave me behind, when the time comes,” Naruto whispers. “It’s mine too.”


	6. Prolepsis

Jiraiya the Toad Sage disgusts him. How the old man manages to get anything done is beyond Naruto. Even now, he’s trying to peek over the wall of an onsen into the women’s section, his face red as a tomato and his mouth stretched out in a lecherous grin.

 

“Come on, kid, lighten up,” Jiraiya says, trying to wave Naruto over to join him. “Take pleasure in life. Yeah, real pleasure…” He isn’t even _looking_ at Naruto as he says it.

 

Naruto just levels him with his best Mikoto Uchiha glare and stands firm.

 

He understands, of course, why they gave him to Jiraiya. Sasuke had a lightning affinity and the Sharingan, so going with Kakashi made sense. Sakura didn’t have a match to prepare for and was therefore on leave. Naruto guesses that convenience and his more personal connection with Jiraiya is what made the Hokage go so overboard as to give him to a Sannin.

 

Naruto just didn’t anticipate _this._

 

Finally, tired of waiting, Jiraiya turns around to Naruto and huffs, very put upon. “Jeez, kid, you’re no fun.” He walks up to Naruto and tries to flick him in the head. “Seeing that face with that expression is creeping me out.”

Naruto catches Jiraiya’s fingers before they make contact with his forehead. “Stop it.”

 

“You really are a bore, aren’t you?” says Jiraiya. He stoops down to peer in Naruto’s face. “On second though… you don’t look anything like him at all.”

 

“Thank you…?” Naruto replies. He knows who Jiraiya is talking about, he just doesn’t understand why Jiraiya’s stuck on the subject. “And your point is?”

 

“I don’t know.” Jiraiya shrugs and straightens. His face lights up with a smile and he snaps his fingers. “You must at least know who I am, then.”

 

“You’re Lord Jiraiya,” says Naruto. “The Hokage’s student, the Toad Sage of Mount Myoboku, one of the Legendary Sannin.”

 

“Yeah, okay, but less textbook, kid,” Jiraiya grumbles.

 

Naruto raises an eyebrow. “You’re… my birth father’s old teacher?”

 

It’s Jiraiya’s turn to raise an eyebrow. He mouths the words ‘birth father’ and then says, “The Uchiha really pulled a number on you, didn’t they?”

 

“Excuse me?”

 

“I can’t imagine Kushina’s face if she’d heard you say that!” Jiraiya barks out a laugh. “I don’t think she even called her own old man ‘father’”.

 

And, there, Naruto gets it. He rolls his eyes. “You think I’m a snob.”

 

“I wouldn’t say that.”

 

“Won’t be the first.”

 

“People really called you a snob?”

 

“Is it that unbelievable?” Naruto glares. Why’s he getting defensive over an insult?

 

Jiraiya motions with his shoulder. “I don’t know, I mean… People around here knew your parents. I’d’ve thought their memory would’ve kept people from calling you… snobby…”

 

“Yeah, well, you know, my parents died a while ago,” says Naruto. “Both sets, actually.”

 

He’s being weird. Why is he being weird? This Toad Sage just rubs him entirely the wrong way, like a cactus over velvet. Even the analogy is making the hairs on Naruto’s nape stand.

 

Jiraiya looks appalled. “Wow, kid, _dark_.”

 

“Family speciality,” Naruto bites out. He almost feels the Uchiha crest on his back burning into his skin.

 

The silence that that statement leaves could break the conventions of physics with the tension it contains.

 

“O-kay…” Jiraiya seems to have run out of steam. He looks at the ground awkwardly, and then turns on his heel. “Well, let’s go learn some jutsu, I guess…”

 

Naruto follows him with his arms still crossed, face red from embarrassment. What on earth had gotten into him?

 

 

 

A few days later, Naruto knocks on the door to Sasuke’s hospital room, holding a bag of fruit and tomatoes. He can hear voices inside—Ino and Sakura. They hear the knock and stop. A moment later, the door opens.

 

“Oh, Naruto,” Ino says, blushing. “It’s you.”

 

“Hey,” he says, raising a hand.

 

From inside the room, he hears Sakura huff and say, “Time to stop bothering them. Get better soon, Sasuke.” She pushes Ino out. “Let’s go.”

 

“Hey, watch it, Forehead!” Ino yelps but goes anyway. Naruto steps aside to let them pass, and then goes inside, closing the door behind him.

 

He plops his bag on the foot of Sasuke’s bed and sits down. Sasuke looks as tired as ever. Naruto tosses him a tomato and digs out an orange for himself, starting to peel.

 

“You look like shit,” he says.

 

Sasuke bites into the tomato and juice dribbles down his chin. He tries to catch it with his other hand and fails. Naruto snorts.

 

“How’s the Pervert?” Sasuke says.

 

“Lord Jiraiya? He’s great,” Naruto deadpans.

 

“Hmm,” Sasuke hums. “At least you’re getting some training in.”

 

Naruto gives Sasuke an orange slice and eats one himself. “Has Kakashi shown up yet?”

 

“No.” Sasuke bites down vindictively. Then, he looks up. “Sakura said he’s in the hospital, though. I wonder why.”

 

“He and one of the other teachers fought against someone in the village, but they won’t say who,” Naruto informs him.

 

“Why the secrecy?” Sasuke leans back against his pillow. Naruto tosses him another orange slice.

 

“Political incident?” Naruto says.

 

“Probably.” Sasuke sighs. “Anyway, he won’t be training me until we’re both out of this dump.”

 

“Don’t do anything stupid, okay?” Naruto says. He glances at Sasuke’s mark. Sasuke catches the look and hides it behind his hand. Naruto frowns. He looks up. “Sasuke. I’m serious.”

 

“Don’t worry.”

 

Naruto huffs. He leans away from Sasuke and gives him a hooded look.

 

“What?” says Sasuke.

 

Naruto keeps staring. Finally, he shakes his head. “Nothing.” He stands up, leaving the bag behind. “Get better soon.”

 

“Naruto—”

 

But Naruto’s already leaving, throwing a careless wave over his shoulder.

 

 

 

 

 

“What’s eating at you, kid?” Jiraiya says.

 

They’re at a rocky riverbank just south of the village proper, in a small clearing between streams. A waterfall thunders in the background, sending cool mist into the air.

 

Naruto shrugs off Jiraiya’s question irritably and continues concentrating on water balloon in his hands, trying to make the water inside it spin.

 

“Alright then...” Jiraiya sighs. He points at the ball. “Remember, spin _with_ your chakra.”

 

“I’m _trying,_ ” Naruto snaps. It’s just hard. He can’t mould his chakra like that—it’s too big, too unruly. It’s making him want to rip his own hair out.

 

“You said this was an A-Level technique, right?” Naruto grits out. The damn water balloon just won’t _burst._

“Yes,” says Jiraiya, crossing his arms. He looks sideways at Naruto.

 

Naruto ignores him. He ignores everything. The water inside the balloon spins, but nothing else is happening. He doesn’t know what he’s doing wrong. He tries to add more chakra, more power, but it just makes the balloon wobble more.

 

“Damn it!” Naruto screeches. He slams his free hand against the ball, sending a jolt of sideways chakra through it. It explodes with a bang.

 

Jiraiya jerks back, eyes wide, avoiding the splash.

 

Naruto stares at the remnants of rubber in his hands, his front soaked. What…?

 

“Well,” Jiraiya says. “I suppose that’s one way to do it.”

 

He glances at Naruto, at the surprise in the boy’s face, and then hands him another balloon.

 

“Again,” he says.

 

 

 

 

 

Naruto doesn’t go to the hospital.

 

He lies in his bed, at home, and seethes, tracing spirals over and over on his palm. His whole arm burns from overuse, the pain lancing down. He’s never felt his chakra coils this clearly before.

 

His ceiling is the object of his rage. He wants to burn down the white plaster with his eyes alone. Then, an idea.

 

He points his palm up and concentrates on its centre. Spiral. Round and round. A sphere. He pushes chakra out and tries to mould it, ignoring the piercing pain. Just push through it, push until his chakra burns bright blue, lashing out. He grits his teeth until they creak and continues pushing. Spin it, clockwise, anticlockwise—it had to coil in on itself, tie like a rat king, until it could bore through tree trunks and leave craters in the ground. The pain was starting to get unbearable.

 

Red chakra lances through his blue, and he gasps, losing concentration. The half-formed ball explodes outwards with a boom, rattling loose objects in the room.

“Fuck!” he yells. His palm is scraped raw of skin, stinging and red. Tears prick at his eyes. He hisses, “Fuck…”

 

Even now, the damned fox heals him, his skin crawling back over exposed dermis and settling. He clenches his hands and doesn’t even feel a jolt of pain.

 

Again, his anger, directionless, turns to the fox. The one thing that was stopping him, always there, always too much to control. The Hokage, Kakashi—they’d all said to temper it, repress it, control it. Jiraiya had thrown out a cryptic comment about using it and then changed the subject. Naruto grits his teeth, clawing at his stomach. He feels nothing but his own nails digging in. No stirring, no hapless churning of his gut as the fox perks up. It that what he felt when he stood opposite Gaara? The fox?

 

And then his train of thought stops at Sasuke, as it usually does these days.

 

Sasuke, who vanished from his damn hospital room that morning. Naruto found out because Sakura had interrupted his training session with Jiraiya to tell him. She’d stared at his red-raw hands and told him that both his brother and Kakashi were gone.

 

It makes him want to break something.

 

Sasuke is so stupid. Reckless and feckless and careless, and Naruto knows why. He knows what Sasuke’s going to do—he’s always known what Sasuke was about to do. Ever since they were in diapers.

 

Sasuke’s going to leave. He’s realised by now that Konoha will never give him the power he needs. Orochimaru might. The world out there might.

 

Naruto clenches his palm and starts tracing the spiral again in his mind, watching it spin. He feels chakra thrumming beneath his skin.

 

 

 

 

_Interlude — Sasuke_

“You’ve left a mess behind, Sasuke,” Kakashi chides, arms crossed and leaning against a rocky outcropping.

 

Sasuke ignores him. He channels his chakra down his hands, to where a fledgling chidori stings at his fingers. He lost feeling in his palms long ago, and he’s starting to smell burned keratin.

 

Kakashi looks up, as if listening for something. He hums. “The ANBU must be getting pretty nervous right about now.”

 

He’s been ‘missing’ for a week and a half. Naruto doesn’t know, Sakura doesn’t know. Kakashi wonders if the Hokage even knows where Sasuke really is.

 

Sasuke tuts and channels more chakra down. Almost there—the chidori glows brighter. He can feel the tense energy ready to explode. Contain it. _Contain it._

“You wouldn’t do anything to warrant their real nerves right, Sasuke?” Kakashi asks nonchalantly.

 

The chidori bursts, slicing a long line down Sasuke’s left arm. He hisses and grabs at it, but it’s not bleeding. Instant cauterisation. He growls and glares at Kakashi.

 

Kakashi isn’t looking at him. He’s looking aside, at a spot of raised rock a few meters away. Sasuke frowns and follows his gaze, but there’s nothing there but a swirling ball of dust. He returns his glare at Kakashi.

 

Kakashi finally notices it. “What?”

 

“Stop distracting me,” Sasuke snaps.

 

He goes back to trying to form the chidori.

 

 

 

 

 

The full-body pain isn’t what wakes Naruto—it’s Shikamaru’s voice. Strained and heady.

 

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

 

He smells the acrid scent of the hospital first, then feels starched linen under his fingers. Naruto grunts and tries to open his eyes. The light stings, but he picks out two figures from the blur. In a second, they solidify.

 

Shikamaru, standing with his hands in the rat symbol, a bag of fruit discarded at his feet. The inky tendrils of his Shadow Bind Jutsu stretch out across the floor. Gaara on the other end, his body locked and his eyes livid.

 

Naruto yelps, trying to scramble away. He can barely move. “What the _hell?”_ He swivels his head around, wincing, and sees sand floating in the air, coalescing into tendrils.

 

“Naruto,” Shikamaru grunts. “You’re awake.” The jutsu strains him.

 

“What’s happening?” Naruto rasps.

 

“I was visiting Chouji. Heard you were here, decided to pay a visit, maybe talk about our match,” Shikamaru says. Then, more serious, “This guy was trying something.”

 

Naruto catches Gaara’s eyes narrowing. He turns to him, trying to move away. The feeling in his gut—the damned _fox_ —won’t abate. It’s getting painful.

 

Shikamaru says to Gaara, “Well? What were you trying to do?”

 

Gaara speaks with the same creaky hiss: “I wanted to see what was inside him.”

 

Shikamaru’s eyes widen in shock. Naruto pales, and hopes Shikamaru misunderstands. He speaks before anyone else can: “Wh-what do you mean?”

 

Gaara can’t turn his head, but his eyes snap to Naruto’s. He says, “The power inside you. I want to know what it is.”

 

“Naruto, what the hell is he talking about?”

 

Naruto can feel himself start to shake and sweat. It’s part exhaustion, part adrenaline thundering through his veins. He’s treading dangerously close to exposure these days, and he’s losing control.

 

His mouth is dry when he rasps, “You’re insane.”

 

Gaara sneers. “Don’t try to lie. You’re just like me.” Then, lower: “You’ve got a monster inside of you.” He smiles, taps his temple with one finger. “Mine whispers to me. Does yours?”

 

Shikamaru glances at Naruto, face riddled with confusion. Naruto looks at him and can’t stop his own expression. He must look pathetic; pale and pasty and begging for a way out. It only makes Shikamaru’s frown deeper.

 

With a hiss, the sand around Gaara whips up into the air, towering over all three of them and lashing out like tentacles. Shikamaru tenses, head snapping up, but he can’t do anything unless he lets his jutsu go. Naruto draws in a shaky breath, desperately trying to bring up enough strength to at least _move,_ to get away before that sand comes down on him like—

 

The door snaps open with a bang, and Gaara’s eyes widen in shock.

 

“Not to interrupt a party,” says Jiraiya, his hands deceptively relaxed on the door handle. “But I think it’s time you kids got some adult supervision.”

 

Naruto’s never been more grateful to see Lord Jiraiya in his life.

 

“Nara, you can let him go now,” says Jiraiya, still pinning Gaara with his gaze. “He won’t do anything, right?”

 

“R-right away, Lord Jiraiya,” Shikamaru stammers, and lets his rat seal go. The shadows around Gaara’s feet shrink back and vanish.

 

Jiraiya steps aside, leaving the doorway open. To Gaara: “Your comrades are looking for you. Don’t keep them waiting.”

 

For a second, Naruto thinks that Gaara will fight back, but no—the sand slithers back into the gourd on Gaara’s back, grain by grain. Gaara still hasn’t looked away from Jiraiya. He takes a slow step forward, and then another.

 

His last words to the room are a hiss; “Mark my words… I’ll see it loose soon, Uchiha.”

 

Then, he’s gone.

 

Naruto can’t breathe. What’s wrong with him? His heart is pounding, and when he glances down at his hands, his nails are clawed. He hides them in the duvet and snaps his eyes shut, hoping that they’re not slitted. That nobody saw.

 

He hears Jiraiya tell Shikamaru to go, and then the same to someone else. Sakura? Naruto hadn’t even seen her, but he hears her and Shikamaru disappear down the hall. The door shuts.

 

“You can open your eyes, they’re gone.”

 

Naruto knows. He opens his eyes, and then glances down. Normal, human fingernails. He lets out a trembling sigh of relief.

 

Jiraiya picks up Shikamaru’s lost fruits, puts them all into the bag, and hangs it on the foot of Naruto’s bed.

 

He asks, “You feeling better?”

 

Naruto nods.

 

“Do you remember what happened?”

 

Frustration, anger, balancing on the edge of exhaustion from days upon days of failed practice. A whirling Rasengan, lanced through with red chakra, exploding in his hands. Darkness.

 

Naruto rasps out, “Yeah.”

 

Jiraiya grimaces. “Yeesh. Want some water?”

 

“Yes, please.”

 

“Here,” Jiraiya hands him a bottle.

 

Naruto takes a big swing and immediately squirms at the burn in his throat, breaking out into a cough. “Wh-what the hell is this?” He peers into the bottle, then takes a sniff. It smells like _piss._ He glares up at Jiraiya and opens his mouth. “Is this a fucking—”

 

“Chakra replenisher? Yes. You’re welcome,” Jiraiya says. “Nice language, Uchiha.”

 

Naruto grits his teeth, ignores the jab, and eyes the drink again. He doesn’t trust it. He thrusts it back at Jiraiya.

 

Jiraiya shrugs and tucks it back into his bag. “Your loss.” He straightens. “Now, tell me, how does raccoon-eyes know you’re a jinchuuriki?”

 

Naruto tenses, eyes flicking to the door. He convinces himself that nobody’s listening. He says, “He’s got one too.”

 

“Ah,” says Jiraiya, mulling it over. Then: “He must be the One-Tail’s vessel.”

 

Naruto looks up and says, “He said his…talked.”

 

“Does yours not?”

 

Naruto thinks about the sewer. The reverberating growl of the fox’s voice.

 

“No,” he says.

 

Jiraiya presses his lips together and crosses his arms. He does that a lot, Naruto’s noticed. He looks up at Jiraiya pathetically and Jiraiya sighs.

 

“Get some more rest,” he says. “I’ll come back later.” He tosses something at Naruto, and it lands in his lap. “Here, Sakura brought this. See ya.”

 

Naruto looks down, and it’s a scroll on elemental release modifications.

 

 

 

 

 

Naruto dreams of the fox.

 

He stands before it, dressed in black. He’s six again, his hair brushed back the way Mother did it that morning, a little red drop on his cheek.

 

 _Little creature,_ says the fox. _I can feel you hunger for violence._

“What do you mean?” he says.

 

He’s thirteen now, his clothes navy-blue. He buries his face in the high collar of his shirt and keeps his expression closed off.

 

 _Your vengeance,_ says the fox. _It burns inside you. It will destroy you._ It bares its teeth. _I feed on it, and grow._

“Grow?” says Naruto.

 

 _The humans around you cannot see it,_ says the fox, tails lashing behind the iron gates. _You do not show them, not like your brother, but you keep it in your heart._

This makes Naruto step back.

 

 _You want to use my power,_ says the fox. An offer, or a warning?

 

Naruto admits, “I do.”

 

 _Then feed me, little creature,_ says the fox. _Rage; let yourself be the conduct of my cleansing fire, and I will grant you what you wish._

Naruto gets the feeling that if it had the freedom to, the fox would pace. Its great eyes watch him.

“Alright,” he says.

 

The fox grins, and when Naruto sees its gleaming white canines, he realises that each one is twice his size.

 

 

 

 

 

Seven genin step out into the light. The crowd in the arena roars their approval. Up in the wings, surrounded by black-clad ANBU, Naruto can see the Kage looking down on them. He glances to the right, hoping to spot Sasuke, but his brother is nowhere to be found.

 

“Don’t fidget,” says the proctor, Genma Shiranui. “Stand still and face forward, towards the guests.”

 

 _Sir, yes, sir,_ Naruto thinks, folding his hands behind his back. The wind ruffles through his hair, sliding down into the collar of his shirt and making him shiver. Or is it anticipation?

 

He stands and listens to the appreciation of the crowd.


End file.
